Politics

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

Wednesday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Very discreetly, Cameron is writing his first Queen’s Speech

At 9 p.m. on the night before Tony Blair became Prime Minister, he was lying alone on his bed staring at the ceiling. He didn’t want to join his family, watching television, but was eventually dragged down for the News at Ten. ‘No,’ he said, when he heard its exit poll. ‘I accept that we’re going to win, but a landslide? It’s ridiculous.’ This anecdote, recounted in his wife’s autobiography, dramatises what those around David Cameron consider Blair’s worst mistake: a failure to prepare (in Labour’s case, for the sheer scale of victory). It is an error they are determined not to repeat. Not that Mr Cameron expects a landslide.

Tuesday

The Spectator

Intelligence Squared debate: Tax the rich (more)

Tonight Spectator.co.uk broadcasts the latest Intelligence Squared debate: “Tax the rich (more)”. Speaking for the motion are Andrew Hilton, Professor John Kay and Polly Toynbee. Opposing them will be Lord Jacobs, James Bartholomew and Kelvin MacKenzie. You can listen to it live from 18:45, by clicking here.

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Total launch

I headed off to Milbank Tower last night for the launch of Total Politics, the brainchild of Iain Dale. The magazine looks great and has interviews with Gordon Brown and Lynton Crosby as well as articles by the great Mike Smithson, Paul Linford and The Spectator’s very own Clemency Burton-Hill. It is going to be a welcome and impressive addition to the reading lists of us political geeks. One has to take one hat’s off to Iain Dale, it is no mean achievement to launch a magazine in the present climate and to do so while getting married is doubly-impressive. If you want to check out the magazine’s website, it

Peter Hoskin

Where it all went wrong for Brown: the 10p tax debacle

Here’s the first in our series of posts looking back over the mistakes made by Brown in his first year as Prime Minister.  Later in the week, you’ll be able to vote on which mistake you think is the worst. 21 March, 2007. With the words “A Budget for Britain’s families, for fairness and the future,” Brown had just finished his last Budget speech as Chancellor. Or so it seemed. But like Columbo circling around to ask “just one more thing”, he had another announcement to make: “With the other decisions I have made today we are able to hold to our pledge made at the election not to raise the basic rate of income tax. Indeed to reward

Peter Hoskin

Is Davis heading for the Speaker’s chair?

Over on his superb blog, Benedict Brogan indulges in a bit of interesting speculation: does David Davis want to be Speaker? It seems crazy – and probably is – but there could still be something in this.  After all, the smart money’s on Michael Martin stepping down soon.  Whilst Davis’s actions have both establised him as an independently-minded MP and won him support from across the House.  An ideal replacement, some might think. Besides, it’s a bid that Team Cameron could get behind.  If Davis is gunning for the Speakership, then the worry about whether he should be reinstalled on the front bench can largely be swept aside. What do CoffeeHousers think?

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

“Record low” doesn’t cover it

The problem with charting Gordon Brown’s economic slowdown is that the phrase “record low” is not enough. Take today’s data from the British Bankers Association. Its mortgages approval was 27,968 in May – a record low. But the month before, 34,752 was also a record low. And March, at 36,788 was the lowest since 1997. All this matters because what Brown served up to us these last ten years was not prosperity. It was a a mirage, borrowed money, wealth that we didn’t own in the first place. Borrowed against made-up house prices, whose dizzying heights didn’t bother Brown as long as it sent stamp duty up by the same

Peter Hoskin

Stephen Pollard: Social mobility disappeared with the grammar schools

I’d recommend you head over to Stephen’s blog, where he flags up his latest Times article: “Social Mobility disappeared with the grammar schools”.  It’s a great response to Brown’s speech yesterday.  But it should also be required reading for Ed Balls, who has an unfathomable aversion to some of our most successful academic institutions. 

Peter Hoskin

Brown feels the fiscal squeeze

Another week, another great column from Rachel Sylvester. It contains venomous quotes aplenty (e.g. one cabinet minister: “We’re all doomed … We might as well ring the removal vans to take us out of office.”), and some important observations about Labour donors. Here’s the key passage: “I bumped into one rich businessman, who has given substantial sums to Labour, rushing into the House of Lords last week.  ‘I’m not going to give them any more money while Gordon Brown is leader,’ he declared. ‘It’s time for the next generation to take over.’  Another former donor admitted that he was deeply disappointed by the Labour leader’s performance ‘He’s just not up

Monday

Peter Hoskin

Can Brown avoid death by inflation?

We’ve made the point before that Brown’s fortunes are largely wedded to the state of the economy.  After all, he took all the credit for its buoyancy during his time as Chancellor.  So he seems to be the best candidate to take the blame now things have gone awry. The worry for Team Brown is that things may be about to get a whole lot worse.  Over the past few days, the chatter from monetary policy makers has been of how both the private and public sectors need to show pay restraint in order to prevent a particularly vicious inflationary spiral.  Trouble is, many public sector workers don’t exactly share the Treasury’s

Peter Hoskin

Your questions for David Davis

It’s been just over a week since we asked CoffeeHousers to put forward their questions for David Davis.  We’ve since picked out the best ten, which have now been put to the former shadow home secretary.  He’ll get back to us over the next couple of days. The CoffeeHousers whose questions were chosen can e-mail me on phoskin @ spectator.co.uk to claim their t-shirt and 180th Anniversary issue of the magazine. Anyway, here are the questions: 1) Simon Chapman: “The Conservative Party had won the argument and the moral victory. There are still battles to be fought in Parliament. As Shadow Home Secretary, in the current polls, you had the opportunity

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Where it all went wrong for Brown

This Friday marks the first anniversary of Gordon Brown becoming PM. To put it mildly, it hasn’t been a successful start. This week on Coffee House we’ll be putting forward our views on why and where it has all gone so wrong. The obvious answer is the whole debacle of the election that never was. But this is a necessary but not sufficient explanation for why Labour is now recording some of its lowest poll ratings since records began, and why 85 percent of voters think that Brown has done a worse job than they were expecting. On Friday, we’ll invite you to vote for what has been the biggest

Peter Hoskin

CoffeeHousers’ Wall, 23 June – 29 June

Welcome to a new feature on Coffee House – one we’re calling CoffeeHousers’ Wall. Every Monday, we’ll put up a ‘wall’ post and – provided your writing isn’t libelous, crammed with swearing, or offensive to common decency – you’ll be able to say whatever you like in the comments section. There is no topic, so there’s no need to stay ‘on topic’ – which means you’ll be able to debate with each other more freely and extensively (that means you TGF UKIP and Tiberius). There’s also no constraint on the length of what you write – so, in effect, you can become Coffee House bloggers. Anything’s fair game – from political stories in

Peter Hoskin

Two MPs wanted to join David Davis

If you want to quantify the power of David Davis’ campaign for civil liberties, then there’s always this news story in today’s Standard.  Apparently, two other MPs offered to step down – and force by-elections – in sympathy with the former shadow home secretary.  They were only prevented from doing so when Davis told them “there should only be one sacrifice”. What gives the story added spice is the claim that one of the MPs belongs to Labour (the other’s said to be a Tory).  Do CoffeeHousers have any ideas about who the rebel might be? 

The Spectator

Just in case you missed them… | 23 June 2008

Here are some of the posts made over the weekend on Spectator.co.uk: James Forsyth wonders whether a coup is the best Zimbabwe can hope for, and highlights another disastrous poll for Gordon Brown. Peter Hoskin reports on the end to the row between Burnham and Chakrabarti. Fraser Nelson thinks that Boris Johnson was right to accept James McGrath’s resignation. Clive Davis points out a problem with “a particular strain” of multiculturalism. And Americano thinks Team Obama has made a mistake in releasing its own version of the Presidential seal.

Peter Hoskin

Unkind comparisons

Oh dear. It looks as though Brown’s speechwriters have got it wrong, wrong, wrong for his address on social mobility today. Rather than setting out what policy wonks call a “progressive vision”, it dwells all too acrimoniously on Margaret Thatcher, and tries to lay the blame for poor social mobility at her feet. As I see it, there are three immediate problems with this approach: 1) This is the same Margaret Thatcher that Brown stood with on the steps of No.10 last year. He seemed happy enough to be seen with her then – so why the harsh treatment now? It’s nothing more than hypocrisy – and unkindness – on

Sunday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Boris was right to accept McGrath’s resignation in race row

Unlike Iain Dale, I do believe Boris was right to accept the resignation of his political adviser James McGrath earlier this evening. Like Patrick Mercer, McGrath made a remark which could easily have been misrepresented as racist, even though it was not. Here are the specific words he used in an interview.   “McGrath was far from politically correct, David-Cameron-new- cuddly-Conservative Party, when I pointed out to him a critical comment of Voice columnist Darcus Howe that the election of “Boris Johnson, a right-wing Conservative, might just trigger off a mass exodus of older Caribbean migrants back to our homelands”. He retorted: “Well, let them go if they don’t like

Saturday

Charles Moore Charles Moore

The Spectator’s Notes | 21 June 2008

How strange that Gordon Brown’s suggestion this week that MPs should have no say in setting their own pay is being welcomed as a curb on sleaze. If their pay is to be set, as is proposed, by a government-funded agency instead of by their own votes, MPs will cease to be independent legislators and become government employees. Most of British constitutional history (‘I see the birds have flown’) has sought to avoid government control of those we elect, and control of a person’s pay is perhaps the most effective curb of all. We are so disillusioned by our MPs that we now welcome anything they do which discards their

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

WEB-EXCLUSIVE, LONGER VERSION: Poor, brave David Davis has become the Eddie the Eagle of Westminster 

At a dinner party in central London a few months ago, David Davis made an extraordinary confession. He had become disenchanted with David Cameron, he said, and was considering quitting politics. ‘I believe in certain things,’ he claimed, ‘and I do not believe the next Conservative government will implement them.’ He wondered if he should try to earn a little money in the outside world. He did not come across as bitter or regicidal, I am told, just disillusioned — and planning a graceful exit. Or, as it turned out, a rather spectacular one. It is now more than a week since Mr Davis resigned to campaign on the issue

Daniel Hannan

EU leaders will never consult us again

Daniel Hannan, who predicted the Irish ‘No’ vote in this magazine, now says that the EU will simply implement the Lisbon Treaty and never risk a referendum again By ten o’clock on Friday morning, it was clear that the ‘No’s had it. Ireland’s Europhiles were struggling even in their affluent strongholds within the Pale. In the rest of the country, they were being pulverised. A jubilant ‘No’ campaigner rang me from Galway, his words tumbling over each other. ‘It looks like a high turnout, too,’ he exulted. ‘The Eurocrats won’t be able to just carry on as if nothing has happened.’ Oh yes they will, I told him, sadly. They

The Spectator

The old order changeth | 21 June 2008

Until his astonishing resignation from the Commons last week, the prospect of David Davis as the next Home Secretary was one of the foremost attractions of a new Conservative government. On a range of issues from prison policy and police bureaucracy to managed migration and juvenile crime, Mr Davis’s instincts have long been excellent. Since David Cameron’s election as party leader in 2005, furthermore, he acted as a check on the occasional excesses of the Tory modernisers. The ‘decontamination of the Tory brand’ has been a necessary — and highly successful — process. When, from time to time, it veered towards folly, Mr Davis often saved the day, calming the