Politics

Read about the latest UK political news, views and analysis.

Friday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Stripping the bark from Jeremy Corbyn will be the easiest campaign in modern political history

Lately, I’ve been thinking about Willie Horton and Michael Dukakis. That’s what Jeremy Corbyn’s rise to prominence will do to a fellow. Horton, you will remember, was the convicted murderer who never returned from a weekend furlough granted to him while Dukakis was governor of Massachusetts, and subsequently kidnapped a couple in Maryland, stabbing the husband and repeatedly raping the wife. He became the star of George Bush’s 1988 presidential election campaign. Lee Atwater, Bush’s most pugnacious strategist, had vowed to “strip the bark” from Dukakis and promised that “by the time we’re finished they’re going to wonder whether Willie Horton is Dukakis’ running-mate”.  The Willie Horton ads were ugly – there

Brendan O’Neill Brendan O’Neill

There’s a simple reason why the Stonewall trailer doesn’t feature more ‘trans women of colour’

Aping Isis, trans activists have defaced a historical monument to make a political point. They blacked-up — seriously, with spray paint and afro wigs — the Christopher Street Gay Liberation statue in New York, which commemorates the 1969 Stonewall riots and the birth of the modern gay-rights movement. Their beef? That the monument and a new movie about Stonewall don’t give enough credit to the black and Latino trans women who apparently were among the first to hurl bottles at homophobic cops on that fateful night. Let’s leave to one side the ugliness of sticking a comedy afro on a statue to make it appear black — a PC version

Steerpike Steerpike

Poets4Corbyn: Jeremy Corbyn is immortalised in rhyme

If you thought Corbynmania was limited to female obsession and male politicians growing their facial hair, it’s time to think again. It turns out that Jeremy Corbyn is also inspiring poets everywhere. Steerpike has been sent a copy of a new collection of poems edited by Russell Bennetts, which includes poems by 22 authors who have been inspired by the man of the moment. Among the array of rhymes (and half-rhymes) on offer are poems titled ‘The seven ages of a Labour MP’, ‘unelectable’ and ‘Wongawongaland’.  Nicholas Murray’s ‘J.C.’ offers an insight into why Corbyn is so popular: Corbyn’s no knight in shining vest, or bright Messiah from the West (he’d say) but

Sebastian Payne

Corbyn’s remarks on Iraq and Isis are a preview of the fireworks to come if he wins

Tories are rubbing their hands with glee at the prospect of Jeremy Corbyn winning the Labour leadership contest. Two stories that have broken this morning show precisely why. Returning to the Iraq war — always a comfortable topic for Labour — Corbyn has told the Guardian he would apologise to the British people for the ‘deception’ of the war: ‘Let us say we will never again unnecessarily put our troops under fire and our country’s standing in the world at risk. Let us make it clear that Labour will never make the same mistake again, will never flout the United Nations and international law ‘ ‘The endless delay on the Chilcot inquiry is wrong. But

Thursday

Andrew Marr

Diary – 20 August 2015

This is the Corbyn summer. From the perspective of a short holiday, my overwhelming feeling is one of despair at my own semi-trade — the political commentariat, the natterati, the salaried yacketting classes. Who among us, really, predicted that Jeremy Corbyn would be romping ahead like this? Where were the post-election columns pointing out that David Cameron’s victory would lead to a resurgent quasi-Marxist left? And that’s just the beginning: how many of the well-connected, sophisticated, numerate political writers expected Labour to be slaughtered in the general election? Not me, that’s for sure. Going further back, how many people in 1992 told us John Major was an election winner? That Parris,

Charles Moore Charles Moore

The Spectator’s notes | 20 August 2015

Watching the very pleasant Liz Kendall on television this week, I was struck by how extraordinary it is that more than 40 years have now passed since the Conservatives selected a woman leader and still the Labour party cannot bring itself to do so. (Although, come to think of it, it took Labour 142 years to catch up with the Conservatives in selecting a Jew, so perhaps we have another century to wait.) I am not necessarily saying that Ms Kendall is the answer — she seems able, but inexperienced — but there does appear to be a serious barrier to women at the very top of the Labour party.

The Spectator

Get fracking

Over the past week, the government has finally made a decisive move to kickstart a fracking industry in Britain. Licences have been issued for shale gas exploration and the planning process streamlined so that in future, if local councils fail to make decisions within 16 weeks, the communities secretary will step in and adjudicate. It’s excellent news that the years of prevarication over shale seem finally to have come to a close, and greatly to the credit of our Climate Change Secretary, Amber Rudd, and Communities Secretary, Greg Clark. But the dismally slow speed at which our much-vaunted ‘shale revolution’ has taken place will end up costing this country. The

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Tsipras triggers second election

Greece has already had one election and a referendum this year. Now it’s going back to the polls again with Alexis Tsipras announcing his resignation and snap elections. Tsipras says he has a moral duty to go to the polls after securing Greece’s third bailout, arguing that ‘we did not achieve the agreement we expected before the January elections’ and that he wants voters’ approval before continuing with the programme. But this is also his attempt to secure authority by calling an election at an advantageous time for him, given he was facing a no confidence vote. He had lost the backing of many of his own MPs after his bizarre

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

The anti-immigration Sweden Democrats are now the no1 force in Sweden, polls show

On the Swedish election before last, there was shock that the populist Sweden Democrats ended up with a foothold in parliament. Even more shock when they did well enough in last year’s election to topple the conservative-led government. Sweden’s parliament works on coalitions, but no party wants to do any kind of deal with Sweden Democrats. They’re regarded as toxic, beyond-the-pale. But now, according to a shock YouGov poll today, they’re the no1 party in Sweden. At first it was argued: let these lunatics come to parliament! They’re nuts, let everyone see how mad they are! In fact, they’ve been coming pretty well-prepared to debates in the Swedish Parliament – even the ones that

Steerpike Steerpike

Unite distances itself from Burnham camp after email blip

Oh dear. Andy Burnham’s efforts of late to appeal to Jeremy Corbyn’s left-wing voters may have gone to waste after an email blip this morning. Steerpike understands that he has risked the wrath of one of the unions after an official looking email was circulated to members of Unite, the trade union, urging them to vote for Burnham. With Unite backing Corbyn, members were surprised to receive the email, from Joyce Still and Steve Hibbert of the union’s executive council, asking them to support Burnham in the leadership race: @unitetheunion just rec email from Andy Burnham team in name of J Still & S Hibbert Unire Exec – why are they endorsing Andy in Unites name?

Sebastian Payne

Could Burnham or Cooper stand again in the next Labour leadership contest?

Does it matter who comes second in the Labour leadership contest? According to the polls and bookies, Andy Burnham is vying for second place with Yvette Cooper. Ladbrokes currently have Corbyn on 1/4 to be the next leader, Burnham 7/2 and Cooper 10/1. Assuming these predictions are right and Corbyn wins, it seems unlikely he will hang on through to the 2020 general election. How would he go? In the Spectator this week, Isabel looks at the various plots to get rid of Corbyn — despite the fact he hasn’t even been elected yet. One mooted idea is that he would be forced to resign by his fellow MPs: Some Labour MPs say they would refuse

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Labour ‘members’ object to ‘purge’

Some Labour party members are currently finding out that they can’t vote in the leadership election after all because they’ve been picked up as being insincere members. A number of them are furious about this, understandably, but what’s also understandable, perhaps, is that the party is struggling to consider them as sincere members given they were actively campaigning for other parties until recently. Marcus Chown is angry at being purged, even though he is the ‘twitter lead’ for the National Health Action party, and stood against Labour as a candidate for the NHA in the 2014 European elections. This self-described Labour member, trade union rep and Young Fabian Emily Maiden

Sebastian Payne

Yvette Cooper: I won’t be challenging Labour leadership result

It was Yvette Cooper’s turn to do a Q&A session on the World at One today and it was a pretty dry affair, unlike Corbyn or Burnham. There was nothing new about her policies or stances but Cooper did note that she fears a split of Corbyn wins — ‘the party does seem to be polarising between the different extremes’ — but Labour HQ has assured her that all the necessary checks over entryism are being done: ‘Obviously I hope there have and the Labour party has assured us that they are doing proper and robust checks — you’ve got to have that. We want people to be part of the election and we want people to be joining to be part of the election.

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Labour’s bitter, bitchy battles will continue long after its leader is announced

Why is the Labour leadership contest so vile? It has been the bitterest, bitchiest battle that the party has experienced for a good long while, even though the last contest involved two brothers standing against each other in a very ill-humoured manner. Labour MPs are smarting that after years of fighting in the trenches for their party, they are being accused of being secret Tories – though some Blairites who experienced the misery of the wars between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown confess to a feeling of karmic satisfaction that Gordon Brown is also being described as a ‘Blairite’ by some on the left. One Labourite says: ‘The fact that

Steerpike Steerpike

Coffee Shots: Ed Miliband does a ‘Jeremy Corbyn’

This summer a new craze has taken hold of several politicians. Inspired by the frenzy Jeremy Corbyn’s ‘world weary sea dog’ beard has caused amongst women, both Ed Vaizey and David Gauke grew their facial hair in the style of the Labour leadership favourite. Now it appears Ed Miliband may have jumped on the bandwagon. The former Labour leader has been snapped sporting some serious bristle which bears a striking similarity to the facial hair sported by Labour’s new man of the moment. https://twitter.com/KerronCross/status/634320796110991360 With Corbynmania currently sweeping the nation, Mr S suspects Ed is keen to make sure the Milifandom survives.

Hamish Macdonell

Kezia Dugdale appeals to the Left with personal speech about her past

Jeremy Corbyn really has made socialism trendy – at least in Scotland. We can take that from the speech that Kezia Dugdale, Labour’s Scottish leader, will make a today focusing on the ‘s’ word – something she is unlikely to have done had Mr Corbyn been languishing in the polls. Indeed, it was only a few weeks ago that Dugdale warned that a Corbyn victory would leave Labour ‘carping on the sidelines’. Then, as he started to edge ahead in the race, she started to move, first insisting they shared some similar policies and then meeting him privately at a rally in Edinburgh. Today she will edge even closer to his agenda

Steerpike Steerpike

Rupert Murdoch comes out in support of Jeremy Corbyn

First Russell Brand, and now Rupert Murdoch has joined the list of ‘endorsements Jeremy Corbyn might not actually want’. The News UK media mogul, whose papers backed the Tories in the general election, says that Corbyn is the only Labour leadership candidate who actually believes in something: Corbyn increasingly likely Labor winner. Seems only candidate who believes anything, right or wrong. — Rupert Murdoch (@rupertmurdoch) August 20, 2015 The praise is somewhat limited for Corbyn — who Murdoch says will most likely win — with the newspaper proprietor hastily adding a disclaimer that Corbyn’s beliefs may not actually be right. ‘Seems only candidate who believes anything, right or wrong,’ he says. While Mr S is unsure

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Labour MPs’ next choice: which leadership coup to back

[audioplayer src=”http://rss.acast.com/viewfrom22/thecleaneatingcult/media.mp3″ title=”Isabel Harrdman and George Eaton discuss what happens if Jeremy Corbyn wins” startat=696] Listen [/audioplayer]Jeremy Corbyn’s close friend Tony Benn had five questions he always asked of those in power: ‘What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you exercise it? To whom are you accountable? And how do we get rid of you?’ Labour’s leadership election has a month left to run, but most of those involved think Corbyn will triumph. So they’ve already started working out how they’ll get rid of him. John McTernan, a former Blair adviser, recommends deposing him immediately. As he said on The Spectator’s podcast:

Harry Mount

Antigua

‘Tourism, tourism and tourism,’ said my Antiguan cab driver, when I asked what the country’s main industries were. Still, it’s easy to avoid the other tourists, even though the island’s just over 100 square miles. Take a quad-bike tour — arranged by my hotel, the Sandals Grande Antigua Resort — and you can go from one end of the island to another in a morning, without seeing another tourist. Instead, you’ll see fields of sweet potatoes, dotted with sprawling tamarisk trees; jagged cliffs and pale-yellow beaches, fringed with luminous, aquamarine water. You’ll also come across remnants of old sugar plantations; in the early colonial years, slavery was Antigua’s biggest moneymaker.

Tim Montgomerie

Capitalism’s true enemies

[audioplayer src=”http://rss.acast.com/viewfrom22/thecleaneatingcult/media.mp3″ title=”Fraser Nelson and Freddy Gray discuss the future of capitalism” startat=1326] Listen [/audioplayer]Friends of capitalism feared that the events since 2007 — the financial collapses, bailouts, deficits and austerity — would produce a massive swing to the left, but it hasn’t happened. Voters have consistently chosen sensible, middle-of-the-road parties that undertook to steady the ship rather than sail in completely different directions. In reacting to the biggest crisis to engulf the free enterprise system for decades we’ve learnt that the spirit of the anti-capitalists is willing but their flesh is weak — and also that they’re simply aren’t enough of them. They can’t even read the books that