All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
So at last, the vexed question of who is going to succeed the now 94-year-old Rupert Murdoch has been settled. A deal has been announced that reveals that Murdoch’s eldest son Lachlan, the chairman of News Corp and CEO of Fox Corporation, will now be taking control of the family business. His siblings – sisters
Are Britons getting sicker and sicker – or is our health improving? There seems to be something of a paradox. According to figures from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) the number of sickness absences has increased from an average of 5.9 days per worker in 2019 to 9.4 days in 2024. Interestingly,
Emmanuel Macron projects authority, but he’s trapped. After the collapse of François Bayrou’s government yesterday evening, Macron faces a divided parliament, hostile blocs on both sides, and no obvious way forward. After the crushing no-confidence vote, Macron insists that he will appoint a new prime minister ‘in the coming days’. But appointing a successor without
The resignation of Angela Rayner on Friday created two vacancies. The first was in her formal role as deputy leader of the Labour party; the second was her unofficial status as the next leader-in-waiting. Bridget Phillipson’s decision to stand to replace her can be seen as a bid to seize both mantles. The Education Secretary
This weekend, I bought a ticket to attend the controversial Pride in Surrey (PiS) event, held in Guildford. My interest in the event was heightened because I am currently recording a podcast about PiS’s co-founder Stephen Ireland, who in June was sentenced to 24 years in prison for raping an ‘extremely vulnerable’ 12-year-old boy. He
Jamie Borthwick is an uncommonly fine young actor who, frankly, is far too good for the increasingly strained and schlocky scripts that are churned out to him and the other residents of Albert Square. If you haven’t heard of him, then all you need to know is that he’s been a major character in EastEnders
They say revenge is a dish best served cold, but I have a better serving suggestion. How about revenge plated up simmering, every single day, again and again, inescapable and eternal? For surely that is the intended outcome of Emily Thornberry’s plan to – maybe, possibly – run for the position of deputy leader of
As expected, the government of François Bayrou has lost its vote of confidence in the National Assembly. Three hundred and sixty-four MPs voted to bring down the centrist coalition government, ten months after Michel Barnier’s administration collapsed in similar circumstances. On that occasion 331 MPs cast their ballots against the Prime Minister. Bayrou has been
Shabana Mahmood wasn’t given long in her new gig before facing the media. She became Home Secretary on Friday afternoon, after former deputy prime minister Angela Rayner resigned over an ethics probe into her tax affairs, and this morning set out her stall on immigration. Positioning herself as a ‘whatever it takes’ minister, Mahmood says
Prime Minister François Bayrou’s government has collapsed after a bruising no-confidence vote in the French National Assembly. MPs rejected his budget by a margin of 364 votes to 194, with 25 abstentions, forcing his resignation and plunging Emmanuel Macron’s second term into chaos. On Monday evening, the Élysée released a statement saying that Macron has
Here we go again. In what appears now to be an annual event, the Japanese prime minister has resigned. In a press conference on Sunday evening, Shigeru Ishiba, who had only been in the job since last October, explained that he was leaving because his continuation in post would prove divisive for his Liberal Democratic
As of late August, Nigel Farage’s Reform party now has representatives in local government, Westminster, the Welsh Senedd and the Scottish Parliament. The group’s only MSP is Graham Simpson, a frontline Conservative politician for almost ten years, who defected just under a fortnight ago. I caught up with him at the Reform conference – amid
You can tell a great deal about countries and people by how they react to a horrific act of terror. And this morning’s massacre at the Ramot junction in Jerusalem came at a moment heavy with symbolism: just as the world was waking up to reports of Donald Trump floating a new plan for the
The rules have been fixed and the timetable agreed. So, who will be the key players in the race to be Labour’s next deputy leader? That is the question all Westminster is asking this lunchtime, following Angela Rayner’s resignation last Friday. The party’s National Executive Committee (NEC) met this morning and confirmed that nominations will
It’s all change in Sir Keir Starmer’s government. After his former deputy Angela Rayner resigned from both her government and party positions on Friday following an ethics probe into her tax affairs, the Prime Minister reshuffled his cabinet and his junior ministers. Those weren’t the only changes Starmer made, however – new appointments to the
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Reform UK’s annual conference wrapped up this weekend – and it was anything but dull. From Andrea Jenkyns belting out her original song ‘I’m an Insomniac’ on stage to Nigel Farage trying to keep a sometimes chaotic movement united, the mood was more rally than conference. Despite the optimism in the room, there were obvious
A fugitive father who vanished into the rugged bushlands of the Waikato region of New Zealand with his three children has been shot and killed by police. Tom Phillips’s death marks the end of a case that has gripped the country for nearly four years. Phillips first disappeared from his small Marokopa community with his
London’s entire underground tube system – apart from the Elizabeth Line – is being paralysed for almost a week by a rolling series of strikes called by the RMT union to which the Tube drivers belong. The Tube is not due to return to ‘normal’ until 8 a.m. on Friday. The disruption is the first all-out
On Friday, Angela Rayner resigned as Deputy Prime Minister after a probe into her tax affairs by Sir Laurie Magnus, the Prime Minister’s ethics adviser. In a rather extraordinary scandal, Rayner was investigated after it emerged she had underpaid stamp duty when purchasing a seaside apartment in Hove, East Sussex. Sir Keir Starmer hinted on
Ian McEwan’s new novel What We Can Know isn’t even out yet, and already someone has spotted a goof. In response to an early review in a Sunday paper – which reports that McEwan’s novel is set in a world where a Russian hydrogen bomb has missed its target in the United States, exploded in
This evening Emmanuel Macron will almost certainly be searching for his fifth prime minister since January last year. Francois Bayrou’s decision to call a vote of confidence in his government looks like a calamitous misjudgement, one that will plunge France into another period of grave instability. Comparisons are being drawn with the tumult of the Fourth
“Success”, Winston Churchill was once reputed to have said, “is the ability to go from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” By this metric, Prince Harry must be about the most successful figure in public life today. Despite a series of myriad embarrassments and humiliations, which have included his Sentebale charity descending into chaos,
If you’re a Brit who doesn’t hate Jews – a smaller number than you might think – then you may be surprised by a poll published over the weekend by the Campaign Against Antisemitism, to coincide with its protest march through London. The CAA’s YouGov poll found that the number of people who admitted –
During the five years Jacinda Ardern led New Zealand, much was made of her ‘transparent’ style of touchy-feely leadership and willingness to deal with thorny questions. Yet on the biggest issue of her record – her zero Covid policies – the former Prime Minister has gone missing. A planned week-long public hearing at an inquiry
After 48 hours, the final appointments have been made to complete the government’s reshuffle. A raft of rising stars from the 2024 intake like Josh McAlister, Josh Simons and Kate Dearden have all been handed junior ministerial posts. Kanishka Narayan, a tech enthusiast and Labour’s only Old Etonian, has gone to the Department for Science.
On Friday, former Deputy Prime Minister and housing minister Angela Rayner resigned after an ethics probe into her tax affairs was published. The move prompted Prime Minister Keir Starmer to begin a mass reshuffle of his government, with his new cabinet appointments here. Starmer’s timing made it a rather coincidental coup, with the news overshadowing
It is a plot line worthy of a Sopranos episode. A newly-elected Prime Minister, flushed with electoral success, triumphantly sacks his onetime rival – only to discover, a year later, that she is now in pole position to become his new deputy. That’s right folks, Emily Thornberry – the gin-loving, flag-bashing Islington Dame – has
At the Reform UK conference, Nigel Farage claimed that he would stop small boats crossings in two weeks if elected prime minister. When Laura Kuenssberg asked him how he would manage that, Farage scaled back the promise, saying ‘as soon as the law’s in place, as soon as you have the ability to detain and
The next election will not be won on immigration. Britain has already made up its mind. Voters want it controlled and reduced, full stop. That is why Nigel Farage’s party is head and shoulders clear in the polls. But if Reform’s pledge on immigration has been sold to the British public, the real question, as
Over the past five years, Britain has seen a dramatic rise in the number of people claiming disability benefits. There are now 2.8 million working-age adults who are economically inactive due to long-term sickness, a figure that has risen by over 700,000 since 2019. Personal Independence Payments (PIP) are also increasing rapidly, with over 50,000 new applications
BrewDog is in trouble. Its beers have been axed by nearly 2,000 pubs. Punk IPA – once a craft beer titan – has vanished from bars across Britain. The firm is closing ten of its own pubs, including its flagship bar in Aberdeen. Last month, co-founder Martin Dickie left. There’s little doubt that BrewDog has lost
During the early noughties, I pierced hundreds of ears at Claire’s Accessories, the chain store that collapsed into administration last month in the UK. These piercings rarely went smoothly and the evidence often resurfaced: a wonky earring here, a scar there. Good riddance (unemployment notwithstanding), then, to this lavender blight on teen culture. After a
When King Charles paid tribute to Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks following his death in 2020, he called him ‘a light unto our nation’. It was a phrase that captured something profound and widely felt. Rabbi Sacks, who had served as Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth from 1991 to 2013, was
Today, Pope Leo XIV will perform his first two canonisations, both of which were due to take place earlier this year but postponed after the death of Pope Francis. The recipients will be Pier Giorgio Frassati, an early twentieth century Catholic activist from Turin, and the 21st century’s first saint, Carlo Acutis – also known by