This is great, Smith seems to think they can continue to "support research" in the middle of a compulsory rapid liquidation of a university. That is absolutely amazing levels of wishful thinking.

here's your headline:

They (OfS) still expect 45% of ALL universities to report a deficit this academic year. They are not accounting for "significant variation" across the system (i.e. different types and sizes of institution).

Britain: funding care for the elderly by taxing houses based on what they were worth in 1991, for reasons no one can now remember.

In a way even that might be better. It is more likely to give money to kids needed - a right winger might argue that it could enable a 40 year old to start a business whereas a 60 year old will sit on it. Inheritance is intrinsically unfair, though, and perpetuates the advantage rich people have.

Inheritance tax is good! Tax income and people might earn less. Tax consumption and people might spend less. Tax death, and they're not going to *die* less and also, y'know what, if they did, that would *also* be good. It's one of the best taxes!

It’s especially ironic because the lecture is exactly about the ‘paralyzing cowardice’ of today’s elites.

About universities, corporations and media networks bending the knee to authoritarianism. /4

I share this with respect for the many excellent journalists at the BBC.

And with the hope that transparency helps strengthen, not weaken, our democratic culture. /5

This has happened against my wishes, and I’m genuinely dismayed by it.

Not because people can’t disagree with my words, but because self-censorship driven by fear (Trump threatening to sue the BBC) should concern all of us. /3

This sentence was taken out of a lecture they commissioned, reviewed through the full editorial process, and recorded four weeks ago in front of 500 people in the BBC Radio Theatre.

I was told the decision came from the highest levels within the BBC. /2