Politics

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

Sunday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Working-class hero?

From Prescott’s interview in Sunday Times news review, this description of his home jumps out. “Here is not a working-class hero… but an Englishman in his castle, complete with turrets, eight bedrooms, servants’ staircases and electric gates”.  This recalls what Littlejohn said a while ago: “There have been times I’ve regretted ever inventing the nickname Two Jags.  It helped turn Prescott into a figure of fun, disguising the fact that he is in reality a loathsome, Soviet-style political thug on the make.  The satirical version of The Red Flag — ‘The working-class can kiss my arse, I’ve got the foreman’s job at last’ — could have been written for him.”

James Forsyth James Forsyth

What they spend your money on

The Portcullis column in The Sunday Telegraph has a quite astonishing tale of how the Department for International Development uses its money: “Diligent Tory researchers have established that the ministry spent £8,500 on a survey to find out what sort of gifts British couples buy each other on February 14.” When you think about the Department’s responsibilities this kind of wastage is really quite obscene. One wonders who on earth signed off on it. 

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

The writing’s on the wall

There is a housing development in Brockley, south east London, with an extraordinary piece of graffiti. “Thanks to Gordon Brown, I will never buy a house,” it says, and in super-large lettering no less. It is not without economic rationale. Brown’s easy-money policy at the Treasury led the Bank of England to chase a dodgy inflation measure – therefore, making credit too cheap, and, therefore, inflating an asset bubble. Also Brown’s failure to reform planning laws put an artificial restriction on supply of UK housing in the face of ever-rising demand. But is Brown entirely to blame for housing boom? Not even I would go that far. But this isn’t

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Prescott adds to Brown’s woes

On Saturday it was Cherie talking about what went on behind the scenes during the Blair / Brown era, today it is John Prescott. The result: more bad headlines for Brown. Interestingly, Prescott comes down heavily on Brown’s side–“I have no doubt that Tony was most to blame. He broke his agreement with Gordon, not once but several times”—but with Blair having left the scene, the criticisms of Brown for being moody and difficult to work with receive top billing. The Sunday Times splashes with the headline, “I told Tony to sack Gordon, says Prescott.”

Saturday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Blairs on the trail

Reading through the Cherie interviews in the papers today I was struck by this part of her reply when she was asked if she took any pleasure in Brown’s difficulties: “I would be delighted to campaign for them.” One of the key strategic decisions that Brown will have to take about the general election campaign is how the Labour party uses the Blairs. The Cabinet has very few big beats and there’s no doubt that out on the stump, Tony Blair could drive the news agenda in a way that none of the current cabinet could. But equally, sending Blair out there would remind people both of just how long

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Lost in the shuffle

Peter Hyman’s piece in The Times today is well worth reading if only for this anecdote about one of the Blair reshuffles. On another occasion an MP was sacked for doing nothing wrong. It was merely that when she was replaced in her current job, someone forgot to pencil her in for a new one. The mistake was only realised once the reshuffle had been completed. Mr Blair had to come out with the implausible sounding football manager’s response, telling the shell-shocked MP that he “was playing a rotation system, and she would soon return to government”. Hyman’s serious point—that David Miliband should be made Chancellor—is revealing of the mindset

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

The Blairites bite back

Turns out the mystery story is a Cherie Blair interview being run jointly by The Sun and The Times. The Sun promises to run the “bomshell” interview on its website at midnight. Andrew Pierce (an expert at nicking rivals’ scoops) has the lowdown in the Telegraph – Tony Blair censored his wife’s book, he says, so she’s letting rip in an interview instead. But the extracts suggest even this is far from bilious. Knowing Cherie, all will have all come at a price – hence the expectation and secrecy. You might say: so what, we all know Cherie hates Gordon. But to my mind, there is greater significance of this

The Spectator

Brown is not the problem

In September 2006, as Tony Blair was forced to bring forward his departure date by backbench rebellion, The Spectator predicted a Labour civil war. It was not clear when this conflict would erupt, only that its coming was inexorable. This week, battle commenced. In the wake of disastrous local election results and the loss of London to Boris Johnson, Gordon Brown faces revolt on many fronts. In Scotland, Labour’s leader, Wendy Alexander, has called for a referendum on the future of the United Kingdom. In Westminster, Charles Clarke, the former Home Secretary, has demanded that the PM drop his plans to extend the pre-charge detention period for terror suspects to

Theo Hobson Theo Hobson

‘It’s harder for straights to feel Christian charity than gays’

Theo Hobson meets Gene Robinson, the only openly gay Anglican bishop, who says that homosexuals are more open to the Christian ‘message of radical change’ I am sitting in St Mary’s church, Putney, home of right-on Anglicanism. Bishop Gene Robinson — the gay American whose election nearly split the Anglican church — is seeking reassurance from his fans. He’s had a grilling from our nasty press, he says, and is relieved to be among friends. I get out my pen and prepare to dip it in poison. I feel deeply ambivalent about Gene — not hostile, but very much in two minds. And I think he may hold the future

Stanley Johnson

The hard choices that face the Father of the Mayor

Stanley Johnson is adjusting to his new constitutional position in the life of London: not least deciding which clubs to avoid at lunchtime in order to dodge Boris’s journalist foes Last July, soon after Boris had announced he would be a candidate for the post of mayor of London, the editor of The Spectator very kindly invited me to give my reaction in the columns of this magazine. In the article I wrote then, I described the circumstances of Boris’s arrival in this world, in a hospital on New York’s East Side, around 70th Street. I recalled that, as a modern man, I was perfectly ready to be present at

Anne Hyland

<p>City Life</p>

Clear blue skies and shiny shopping malls, but Mao’s corpulent corpse still presides I went to visit Mao Tse-tung the other day. The embalmed body of the Father of communist China lies in a mausoleum in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. There he rests in his trademark grey suit — the same grey as Beijing’s toxic 21st-century skies. I expected to find a long queue of people waiting to see the still corpulent but very pasty-faced Mao, who lies mostly hidden under a red flag, but there were only a few. Mao is no longer Tiananmen Square’s star attraction. Instead, a giant digital clock counting down the days to the Beijing Olympics

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Don’t expect the cyclone in Burma to have benign political side-effects

In the dark early hours of 12 November 1970 a tropical cyclone swung in from the Indian Ocean and made its way, to devastating effect, up the course of the world’s largest delta — the confluence of two huge river courses, the Ganges and the Brahmaputra — in what was then East Pakistan. The delta was heavily populated with subsistence farmers and, further, the overwhelming majority of East Pakistan lay on land less than 20 metres above sea level and was thus vulnerable to even a gentle breeze lapping the waters of the Indian Ocean. If you were asked to design the perfect country to be all but wiped out

Friday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Not too late to make your vote count…

Voting continues in our exciting quest to determine the most over-rated and under-rated Presidents in American history. But don’t fret, it’s not too late to cast your ballot before the polls close late on Sunday. Simply let me know who you consider the three most over-rated and the three most under-rated US presidents. You can submit votes by emailing me here or in the comments section below. Full details here.

The Spectator

The week that was | 9 May 2008

David Cameron answers your questions Matthew d’Ancona wonders whether Brown has broken the New Labour pact. Fraser Nelson serves up ‘Brownie No.3 – Gordon Brown’s “transitional” 10p tax rate’, and gives the word from Scotland on Wendy Alexander’s call for a referendum. James Forsyth suggests that Gordon Brown should embrace the fight over the Union, and points out that more than half of Labour voters want the Prime Minister to step down. And Peter Hoskin tracks Brown’s charm offensive, and asks whether Cameron has started to tackle Brownies.

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Story alert

A good political story is about to break. Have no idea what, but Westminster’s nervous system is twitching. My only information is that it is “big, followable and with us by midnight”. Stay tuned. UPDATE: The story is “good, but not an earthquake” I am told. That’s good news for the Tories. They don’t want the earth moving under No.10 before election day. P.S. Iain Dale has a fantasy list of what the story could be (“Clegg says it was 130, not 30”). Not long to go now.

The Spectator

The Spectator 180th anniversary party

The champagne was flowing freely at this week’s party in celebration of the The Spectator’s 180th anniversary.  We’ve just put up exclusive footage of the bash on a special corner of the website – new.spectator.co.uk/party.  Check it out for red carpet access, celebrity interviews and all the happenings from behind-the-scenes.

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

A couple of clarifications

Hugo Rifkind today picks up on a point in my Cameron interview where I describe how he has the ring tone from 24 on his phone. “‘It’s an in joke,’ Cameron says, impenetrably”. If this sounds baffling, it is my fault. First it’s not the theme tune but that very specific telephone ring on the CTU, with which aficionados will be familiar. Also, it’s not just Cameron but a few of his staff who have the ringtone. Anyone who has seen 24 where Jack Bauer is seconds away from death or the world collapsing and finds a fresh disaster following every triumph, will understand why Cameron sympathises with the character.

Peter Hoskin

America looks to Cameron

You know an Opposition leader’s doing well when he makes waves across the pond. And – if an important article in today’s New York Times is anything to go by – Cameron’s succeeding on exactly that front. It’s titled ‘The Conservative Revival’, and outlines what the GOP can learn from Project Cameron. Here’s a hefty assortment of the key points, but I’d suggest you read the whole thing: “Today, British conservatives are on the way up, while American conservatives are on the way down…   …The flow of ideas has changed direction. It used to be that American conservatives shaped British political thinking. Now the influence is going the other way.   The British conservative

Peter Hoskin

Will Ken work with Boris?

Ken discusses the lessons of May 1 in an article for the Guardian today. There’s not much there, beyond talk about how he performed better than Labour did nationally, and about how he had the best policies for London. In which case, the real point of interest may be at the end of the article. Will Ken be working with Boris, as some have predicted? Don’t count on it: “Amid the worst electoral defeat for 40 years, even Labour’s best electoral performance in the country could not stop London entering into a period of Tory decline. But as that decline proceeds, a new progressive alliance will be forged, which will

Thursday

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Referenda Agenda

Steve Richards in the Independent today: I wonder still if the referendum will ever be held in Scotland. Precedent suggests something or other will get in the way. What a titanic moment it was in British politics when in 1991 John Major persuaded his Chancellor, Ken Clarke, to support a referendum on the Euro. Mr Clarke has regretted conceding the ground ever since, one of those moments when the Euro-sceptics proclaimed a significant victory. Of course the referendum was never held, neither by the Conservatives, nor by Labour who also offered one. As Richards says, this was a significant victory for the euro-sceptic cause. It didn’t just commit the Tories