Politics

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

Tuesday

Gavin Mortimer Gavin Mortimer

The plot to ban X in France

Clara Chappaz is the minister delegate for Artificial Intelligence and the digital economy in the government of Emmanuel Macron. At the weekend she appeared on a television discussion entitled ‘Trump-Musk: Are we ready?’ Chappaz, 35, is very much a Macronist, an entrepreneur who did her MBA at Harvard Business School before launching a successful start-up. French progressives are flexible in their approach to free speech. They’re all for it, as long as they agree with it She expressed her growing concern about the direction certain social media platforms were headed, and the consequences for millions of French people who use them. ‘We have to make sure that wrong opinions are

Steerpike Steerpike

Tulip Siddiq named in second corruption probe

When it rains for the Labour lot, it pours. Pressure is piling on Labour minister Tulip Siddiq to resign from her anti-corruption role as it now transpires the City minister has been named in a second Bangladesh corruption inquiry linked to her aunt’s corrupt regime. The UK Anti-Corruption Coalition has slammed Siddiq for remaining in post, insisting that the Labour MP ‘currently has a serious conflict of interests’. Oh dear. As reported by the Times, Bangladesh’s Anti-Corruption Commission has claimed that Siddiq ‘reportedly used her influence and special powers’ to influence her aunt and former authoritarian premier of Bangladesh Sheikh Hasina to allocate land to family members. Deputy director of

Ross Clark Ross Clark

Europe’s car industry is under attack on all fronts

It is half a century since Britain’s native car industry embarked on its long, painful decline, precipitated by Austin Allegros with rear windows falling off, endless strikes over the length of tea breaks and terrible commercial decisions such as to cede the hatchback market to overseas competition. But where Britain led, Germany and France now seem to be following. How much longer before names like Peugeot, Renault, and even Volkswagen, either disappear or become reduced to mere badges affixed to Chinese-designed and produced vehicles? The retreat of the European car industry has cropped up from time to time in recent months. In October, Volkswagen announced, for the first time, its intention to

Matthew Lynn

Spain will regret its 100 per cent expat property tax

They drive up prices. Rents go through the roof. And the locals can no longer afford a home. The Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez is so fed up with wealthy expats inflating the property market he is planning a 100 per cent tax on anyone from outside the EU buying a home in Spain. Of course, that might prove popular in the short term – but Spain will pay a high price for slamming the door shut on well-off foreigners.  To pretend driving expats out will make any difference to the average Spaniard is just ridiculous Any who dreamt of buying a small place on the Costa del Sol or

Nigel Jones

Will the AfD’s deportation pledge win over German voters?

Next month’s German federal election on 23 February revolves around the disputed meaning of a single toxic word: ‘remigration’. Until the current fiercely fought campaign began, the word was an unmentionable taboo in German politics for obvious historical reasons, since, according to left-wing linguists, it suggested comparison between the deadly forced deportation of Jews by the Nazis during the Holocaust with the way that unwelcome immigrants are treated in today’s Germany. But at the weekend that taboo was shattered by Alice Weidel, co-leader of the hard right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party, when she used the ‘verboten’ word while launching the insurgent party’s election campaign in its East German heartland. Weidel

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Labour MPs turn on Starmer over grooming gangs

Will Keir Starmer have to change his tune on a public inquiry into the grooming gangs scandal? Just last week, the Prime Minister appeared to suggest those calling for a new inquiry into grooming gangs were jumping on a ‘far-Right bandwagon’. However, since then – and following a backlash over the comment – Starmer appears to be slowly changing his position. At Prime Minister’s Questions, Starmer suggested everyone was entitled to their own opinion on whether there should be an inquiry into the scandal between 1997 and 2013, which saw children as young as 11 raped and trafficked by gangs of men, predominantly of Pakistani descent. Champion is backed by

Steerpike Steerpike

Reform neck and neck with Labour, poll reveals

Uh oh. 2025 hasn’t gotten off to the best start for Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour lot and YouGov’s first Westminster voting intention poll since the July election is unlikely to brighten the mood in No. 10. The new poll reveals that support for Starmer’s army has plummeted nine points in the survey with just over a quarter of Brits backing the government lot – while Nigel Farage’s Reform party has seen its support soar by ten points to leave it almost neck and neck with Labour. Kemi Badenoch’s Tories have lost two points, while the canvassing of 2,279 adults – carried out between 12-13 January – shows the Lib Dems

Gareth Roberts Gareth Roberts

The ‘grooming gangs’ delusion is finally being shattered

The re-eruption of the rape gangs scandal has shone a dazzlingly bright light on the language that makes us flinch and fluster, and clutch at euphemistic straws. For years, the mass sexual abuse of thousands of vulnerable girls in towns across England has been blamed on ‘grooming gangs’. But this euphemism hardly does justice to this appalling scandal. ‘Asian grooming gangs’ is a mealy-mouthed phrase In the last fortnight, there has been a shift to a different, more accurate term – ‘rape gangs’ – that better describes who was responsible. This change in terminology is long overdue. And while it offers few crumbs of comfort to the victims, it is

Alexander Larman

The Sussexes’ tone deaf attack on Meta

Who do the Duke and Duchess of Sussex think they are? Since their quasi-abdication from the royal family five years ago, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have seldom found a publicity angle that they were not prepared to exploit for their own personal (and commercial) gain. But the sheer effrontery of the statement that they have put out this week, criticising Meta for scaling back its fact-checking initiatives from public posts, takes some beating. Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg declared that fact-checkers “have destroyed more trust than they’ve created, especially in the US”. But this is not good enough for the Sussexes, and they have responded with vigour. The pair announced

Daniel Thorpe

Will foreign fighters in Syria export their jihad? 

By the gates of the great 8th-century Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, a group of Central Asian-looking gunmen stand in the uniform of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). It is unclear whether they are visiting or guarding. When I approach, they say they are from ‘East Turkistan’, referring to the Uyghur part of China. Their Arabic is hardly comprehensible, but when I ask in Turkish they speak more fluently. ‘We have been waging jihad in the north in Idlib for ten years,’ the eldest says in a low voice. He looks ten years younger than the age he gives. ‘With the permission of God, we prevailed over the Assad regime. They say we’ll get Syrian citizenship.

Lee Cohen

Trump’s team will show Rachel Reeves how it’s done

As Trump Treasury Secretary nominee Scott Bessent rises, full of promise for his confirmation hearing in Washington next week, the UK is still reeling from a plunge in the value of the pound and a sharp rise in borrowing costs, directly tied to Rachel Reeves’s economic policies. The contrast in the approaches of these respective leaders could hardly be more stark. Bessent, a figure whose appointment has Wall Street buzzing with optimism, contrasts sharply with Rachel Reeves, whose policies, compounded by the net zero fanaticism of Ed Miliband, are proving to be the harbinger of economic catastrophe. This comparison isn’t just about individual competence; it’s about the contrasting philosophies of

James Lewisohn

Here’s what Greenland should do about Donald Trump

Greenland’s prime minister Múte Egede has responded to Donald Trump’s overtures to buy the island by saying it is time to shake off ‘the shackles of colonialism’ and hold an independence referendum. As Egede works out how to proceed on the path to independence from Denmark, and how to respond to Trump as he prepares to take office, he would be advised to do a little background reading. For Donald Trump’s policies are increasingly informed by his key lieutenant, Elon Musk; Musk’s friend and fellow PayPal co-founder Ken Howery will be the next US Ambassador to Denmark; and Musk’s key philosophical text is The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, which reminds us: ‘Space

Robert Service

Why Trump bullies Nato

President-elect Donald Trump has in recent years talked about ‘buying’ Greenland. Until recently his comments attracted little attention but recently he shocked the world by threatening the use of economic coercion or military force to fulfil his wish. Male gorillas in the forests of west Africa engage in chest-beating to see off their rivals but Nato, to which the Kingdom of Denmark has belonged since its foundation in 1949, is meant to be a zoo park in which all the wardens sign up for a working partnership. What is behind this public breach in diplomatic etiquette? Americans can point to earlier times when they expanded their territory by purchase, not

Monday

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Sturgeon-Murrell split & Scotland’s Reform challenger

13 min listen

Former Scotland First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has announced she is separating from her husband Peter Murrell, former chief executive of the SNP. The announcement comes as the police probe into the SNP’s funds and finances remains ongoing, with Sturgeon and ex-SNP treasurer Colin Beattie under investigation while Murrell was charged with embezzlement in April 2024.  Katy Balls is joined by The Spectator’s editor Michael Gove, and data editor Michael Simmons, to discuss the separation, why the investigation is still ongoing four years later, and what chances Scottish Labour or Reform have against the SNP in 2025. 

Steerpike Steerpike

Reeves will remain Chancellor until next election, No. 10 insists

Another day, another Labour drama. Rachel Reeves has returned from her weekend China trip to a rather uncomfortable atmosphere back home after last week’s bond market turmoil – with the Labour lot facing surging borrowing costs while Whitehall departments fear further spending cuts. So perhaps it’s not all that surprising that the question of how long Reeves can hold onto her job keeps cropping up… Taking questions from journalists after his speech on AI this morning, Sir Keir Starmer got the Westminster rumour mill running after he refused to confirm whether Reeves would still be Chancellor of the Exchequer by the next general election. Eyebrows were raised when the PM

Ben Goldsmith

Bring back lynx to Britain

The surprise appearance and subsequent safe capture this week of a seemingly tame family of Eurasian lynx in the Scottish Highlands, more than a millennium after the species was extirpated from Britain, has been by far the most bizarre British news story of the year so far. For a brief moment, one of Britain’s most iconic extinct species is now dominating the national discourse – which can only be a good thing. The big question arising from this story, though, is not how the unfortunate creatures got there; but why the lynx, a secretive, beautiful British native species, was not officially reintroduced to Britain long ago. There are no good reasons

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Is Westminster forgetting about the grooming gangs already?

Remember grooming gangs? Last week’s big story has amazingly already been superseded by other political rows, but they came up again at Home Office questions in the Commons this afternoon. Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp used his topical question to ask Yvette Cooper whether she now agreed with Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham and Liverpool Walton MP Dan Carden that there should be a ‘proper national public inquiry’. Cooper did not agree in her response, but equally she didn’t rule out an inquiry, showing how far the government has had to shift from its initial adamant position that those calling for an inquiry were jumping on a ‘far-right bandwagon’.  Presumably

Oscar Edmondson

Why hasn’t Tulip Siddiq been sacked yet?

18 min listen

It’s rare that a world leader knows the name of a junior minister in the British government – let alone calls for them to be sacked. Yet that is the feat achieved by Tulip Siddiq, No. 4 in Rachel Reeves’s Treasury team. The anti-corruption minister is now facing calls to resign from the leader of Bangladesh, who condemned the use of properties gifted to her and her family by its former regime. Elsewhere, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch joined the chorus of people calling for Siddiq to resign over the weekend, warning of a diplomatic crisis. On the Sunday media round, even Science Minister Peter Kyle refused to say that the

John Ferry John Ferry

The SNP’s ferries disaster isn’t over yet

The Scottish ferry, the Glen Sannox, has completed its first passenger journey, 2,610 days after it was infamously launched with fake parts and painted on windows by then First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.  Unlike the staged fanfare of that 2017 event, no children were bussed in to wave Saltire flags at Troon harbour this morning, nor speeches given by any government official. This was a quiet affair, in line with current First Minister John Swinney’s strategy of distancing himself from the failings of the Sturgeon era.  In 2017, Nicola Sturgeon said the new boat would contribute to ‘Scotland’s world-leading climate change goals’. It seems it might instead negatively impact those climate ambitions Islanders will no

Simon Hunt

The fatal flaw in Starmer’s AI plan to save Britain

You’d be forgiven for thinking the government’s new AI Opportunities Action Plan lacks ambition. While frontier AI businesses in the US and China are developing dazzlingly powerful AI tools to cure diseases and solve mind-bending equations in physics, Sir Keir Starmer today promised that artificial intelligence would ‘spot potholes more quickly’. Leaving this Starmerism aside, there is lots of detail in the plan to get tech companies excited. The creation of so-called ‘AI growth zones’ to build tech infrastructure faster and attract clusters of AI expertise in targeted locations brings huge promise. The history of technological advances, from social media to semiconductors, is often a story of bright, like-minded individuals