Politics

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

Wednesday

23 Nov 2022

Steerpike

Spectator Parliamentarian of the Year 2022, in pictures

What a year in politics it has been. 2022 has seen five Education Secretaries, four Chancellors, three Prime Ministers but there is only one Spectator and so it was no surprise to see some of Westminster’s most familiar faces descend on London’s Rosewood Hotel. Ministers and their opposite numbers tonight enjoyed the chance to break bread and toast each other. Master of Ceremonies for the evening was Robert Buckland, the man who switched from backing Rishi Sunak to Liz Truss in the first leadership race of the year but then ended up being sacked when the former succeeded the latter in October. He quipped: ‘Last year I was referred to

Lloyd Evans

The SNP’s howls of outrage at PMQs

Indyref dominated today’s PMQs. The Supreme Court has ruled out Nicola Sturgeon’s plan for a wildcat referendum, she must now proceed with Westminster’s blessing. Howls of outrage were heard from the SNP. Eight of its members stood up to complain that they felt trapped in the union against their will. Rarely have the Scots Nats made such a splash at PMQs and their exposure today did them no favours. When a party surges in popularity, the quality of its MPs declines and it’s clear that many safe Scottish seats have fallen into the hands of incompetent duffers. Few SNP members in Westminster can craft a memorable phrase. Some struggle to

James Forsyth

What does the Supreme Court ruling mean for the SNP?

14 min listen

Starmer and Sunak have today come up against each other at PMQs for the first time since the Autumn Statement. It was an occasion dominated by questions from the Scottish Nationalists on the decision handed down by the Supreme Court ruling against a new independence referendum. James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman discuss. Produced by Oscar Edmondson.

Isabel Hardman

The Tory planning row is becoming increasingly bitter

The Tories are really wheeling out all the greatest hits for party rows at the moment. Not content with a fight over the weekend about Brexit, they’re now having an increasingly bitter scrap about planning reform. Last night, ministers delayed a crunch vote on top-down housing targets after it became obvious they were going to have a serious revolt on their hands. The second day of the report stage of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill has been put off from Monday to a date in the near future – government sources tell me they are still expecting a vote before Christmas – after Theresa Villiers gained the support of

Iain Macwhirter

Sturgeon’s referendum plan could ruin the independence dream

So much for Plan B. Supporters of Scottish independence are putting a brave face on the emphatic ruling by the Supreme Court that – surprise, surprise – the Scottish parliament does not have the power to call a referendum on independence. Lord Reed cast aside the sophistry that ballot would be ‘merely advisory’ — so are all referendums under the UK constitution. And of course a referendum on Scottish independence would ‘relate to’ the constitution which is reserved to Westminster. Sturgeon will now be unable to proceed with her referendum scheduled for October next year – not that anyone serious thought it likely to happen. Why anyone believed that the

Charles Moore

MPs won’t ditch the House of Lords

The Supreme Court decided rightly on Wednesday, rejecting the Scottish government’s claim that a second referendum on independence was not a ‘reserved matter’. But since it was obvious from the beginning that this was the case, why did Nicola Sturgeon insist on bringing an unwinnable action? Presumably to lay blame, as usual, on UK authorities. The Supreme Court is presented as the enemy of the people, Ms Sturgeon conveniently forgetting that the people, when last asked, voted against independence and may not wish to be asked again in the hope that they will give the ‘right’ answer. The SNP will now claim that the next Scottish parliament election will be amount

The Spectator

In defence of Brexit

Opponents of Brexit have been given plenty of ammunition in recent weeks. Trade with the European Union has taken a big knock. Many British exporters say that owing to the excessive bureaucracy they can no longer sell to the Continent. The United Kingdom’s new trade deals have promised a lot but delivered little. There is worldwide inflation, but Britain is still expected to be the worst economic performer in Europe next year, by some margin. Opinion polls suggest an ever-growing number of voters think it was a mistake to leave. This magazine is the only publication to have backed British independence in both the 1975 and 2016 referendums – arguing

James Forsyth

Why Starmer’s going after the Lords

It’s not just the government that’s now beholden to forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility. Keir Starmer told the BBC that Labour doesn’t ‘quarrel with the number that the OBR put out as a target or trying to get the debt down’. So Starmer accepts that the government needs to find around £50 billion through spending cuts or tax rises to get debt falling as a percentage of GDP in the medium term. This applies not only to the current government, but to any government he may run in the future. Of course, Labour stress that they would make ‘different choices’ to the Tories in how they close a

Isabel Hardman

Sunak and Starmer risk getting too comfortable at PMQs

Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak seem to be settling into a comfortable but largely unremarkable slanging match at each Prime Minister’s Questions. Today the pair traded one-liners about each other while failing to land any blows or indeed move the political debate along at all. The Labour leader opened by condemning Fifa and the behaviour of the Qatari regime during the men’s football World Cup, before performing a handbrake turn to talking about the economy. Sunak had been leafing through his briefing notes to find the section on Qatar, but found himself instead responding to a question about why Britain faces the lowest growth of any OECD country over the

Alex Massie

It could soon be game over for Nicola Sturgeon

The idea that a referendum on Scottish independence could be held without it having any bearing on the constitution of the United Kingdom was – though Lord Reed did not quite put it like this – utterly preposterous. This was what the Scottish government argued, however: Holyrood could legislate for a referendum because such a plebiscite would be of no consequence. As a matter of common sense this was evidently specious nonsense; as a matter of law, it is an argument which has been rejected by the Supreme Court today. Sturgeon’s response was risible. Lord Reed’s judgement that Scotland is neither a colony nor an oppressed nation actually demonstrates that

Rory Sutherland

What the media is doing to our politics

An American academic told me that during the 2016 presidential election nobody in academia believed there was the faintest chance Donald Trump would win. Except for the primatologists, that is. It was that silverback gorilla, alpha male thing – and Trump played the role freakishly well. One election tweet showed him enthroned in his private jet eating a KFC meal, gravy and all. This said ‘I have a Boeing 757 with monogrammed headrests, but I eat the same food as you.’ That’s anthropological gold, right there. No one could imagine Hillary Clinton eating KFC – she’d be hospitalised by a trip to Nando’s. No one could imagine Hillary Clinton eating

Andrew McQuillan

Nicola Sturgeon is running out of road

Nicola Sturgeon gave a predictable response to the Supreme Court’s ruling that the Scottish government does not have the power to legislate for a referendum on Scottish independence. The First Minister dialled up the grievance factor by claiming the decision ‘exposes as myth any notion of the UK as a voluntary partnership’. If only there was a vote in the past eight years which disproves her point. The court’s ruling, delivered in the clipped tones of the Edinburgh-educated Lord Reed, was a fitting coup de grace in response to the grandstanding of the Scottish government and Scottish National Party. Rallies and protests are reportedly being scheduled the length and breadth

James Heale

Trading places: George Eustice on Brexit, Sunak and the Australian deal

Is Brexit failing? Those who believe it is point to George Eustice, the former Tory environment secretary, who told the Commons last week that the Australia trade deal was a dud. Here was a Brexiteer, a one-time Ukip candidate, saying that the biggest trade deal of the Boris Johnson years was deeply flawed – a belief Rishi Sunak is understood to share. ‘I don’t regret it,’ says Eustice as we sit in Portcullis House. ‘It was just not actually a very good deal.’ The agreement struck by Liz Truss, then the trade secretary, gave Australia and New Zealand unlimited access to the UK market for its beef and sheep while

Steerpike

Boris takes a pop at Macron

He’s back! Denied power at home, Boris Johnson grabs headlines abroad. The Etonian elephant is currently marauding around Europe, firing off quotes with the force of a Maxim gun. Speaking to CNN Portugal on Monday, Johnson discussed a veritably smorgasbord of issues: Partygate, the mini-Budget and his abortive brief-lived comeback. But it was his reflections on Ukraine that will grab most of the headlines, given Kyiv’s ongoing struggle. Now liberated from the restraints of office, Johnson told the broadcaster that France and President Macron were ‘in denial’ about the prospect of a Russian invasion of Ukraine, saying ‘Be in no doubt that the French were in denial right up until

Fraser Nelson

Scottish independence was never a matter for the courts

It is testament to the SNP’s tactics that today’s Supreme Court judgment on a Scottish referendum happened at all. Of course, the Scottish parliament doesn’t have the power to call referendums: this was an explicit condition of its creation. Schedule 5, part 1 of the Scotland Act spells out the things Holyrood is not allowed to legislate on: among other things, ‘the Union of the Kingdoms of Scotland and England’ and ‘the parliament of the United Kingdom’. So this was never in question, never a matter for the courts. But Nicola Sturgeon pretended otherwise – the better to rally her troops, who always want to believe that battle lies just

Katy Balls

What the Tory planning row means for Rishi Sunak

Rishi Sunak is facing his first Tory Commons rebellion since entering 10 Downing Street. After 47 Tory MPs threatened to back an amendment on planning reform which would oppose compulsory housebuilding targets, the government has pulled the vote until further notice. The rebels were led by former cabinet minister Theresa Villiers and largely consist of MPs with ‘blue wall’ seats who worry that constituent concerns over new developments could cost them their seats. If Sunak cannot persuade the rebels to climb down, his government will seem in a state of paralysis on one of the key issues of the day Inevitably, a war of words has broken out over the so-called

Mark Galeotti

Why Ukraine raided a Kyiv monastery

Perhaps it should not have been a surprise to see the camouflaged special forces of the SBU, the Ukrainian Security Service, fanning out over the usually serene grounds of Kyiv’s Holy Dormition Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra monastery on Tuesday. After all, Vladimir Putin’s political alliance with the Russian Orthodox Church has ensured that his war with Ukraine is also a holy one. And until this year the monastery was under the jurisdiction of the Russian church. But the raid is also a reminder of the dangerous potential for civic strife and the politics of revenge tearing at Ukraine’s unity. Putin, himself a member of the faith, has developed close ties with Kirill,

Tuesday

22 Nov 2022

Katy Balls

Can Rishi weather his first Tory rebellion?

14 min listen

Rishi Sunak is facing his first Tory Commons rebellion on the issue of UK house building targets. Could this be game over? Also on the podcast, after Chloe Smith announced that she will be leaving politics at the next election, could more follow her out of parliament? Katy Balls speaks to James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman. Produced by Oscar Edmondson.

Marcel Plichta

Is providing air defence equipment enough to help Ukraine?

During his first visit to Kyiv last Saturday, Rishi Sunak pledged a new tranche of British military aid to Ukraine. Unlike previous UK support, this new package was entirely focused on air defence: £50 million for anti-aircraft guns (almost certainly purchased via a third party as the UK military does not currently use them), radars, and counter-drone electronic warfare systems. The Prime Minister’s pledge follows a promise made by the UK to provide an additional 1,000 anti-aircraft missiles for Ukraine’s armed forces a few weeks ago. It’s no mystery why air defence has become a key priority. Since October, Russian missiles and drones have pummelled Ukrainian civilian infrastructure and power

Isabel Hardman

Might other MPs follow Chloe Smith out of parliament?

Chloe Smith is just 40 years old, an age at which people normally start to think about entering the Commons. But today, with five election victories in her Norwich North seat under her belt, she announced she’s leaving. The former work and pensions secretary said in a statement: ‘I hope I’ve been able to make a difference, locally and nationally. In 2024, after fifteen years of service, it will be the right time to step back, for me and my young family.’ It’s been quite a stint for Smith, who mentioned ‘tough personal times’ in her announcement: she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2020 and got the all-clear last

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