All the latest analysis of the day's news and stories
There’s more doom and gloom for households today as new figures reveal the first decline in real earnings since September 2014. According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), earnings growth slowed in the three months to March, at 2.1 per cent, compared to previous data which showed wages, excluding bonuses, grew at 2.2 per cent. This
A stirring defence of press freedom from Jeremy Corbyn at his party’s manifesto launch. Urging the booing Momentum authoritarians to have ‘respect’ for the press, Jezza commented: ‘We also recognise that in many societies around the world very brave journalists have lost their lives or are assassinated because they have uncovered the truth about brutal
Prime Minister, I have good news and bad news. The good news is that you have been denounced in the letters page of the Daily Telegraph. One correspondent huffs: ‘I wonder if Theresa May and her small group of advisers closeted in Westminster are aware of the fact that each initiative they introduce in an
Another day, another tax rise. So far in this campaign, the Labour party has rolled out one hit or another on the wealthy and big business just about every morning. The City is getting a Robin Hood tax on every financial transaction. Companies are getting a one-third increase in corporation tax. Anyone on more than
Oh dear. Today Labour have launched a ‘fully costed’ manifesto which fails to mention anywhere the cost of its nationalisation plans. So, with that in mind, Andy McDonald faced an undesirable task in appearing on the Daily Politics to explain how exactly that might work. The shadow transport minister appeared completely out of his depth
Last week, Labour revealed – ahead of schedule – a draft of its manifesto. Today, the party has revealed its official manifesto – and the comparison between the two makes for interesting reading. Here are some of the key policies that have been removed, altered or added to the manifesto. Removed policies The commitment to ‘cover apprentices’
The consequence of last week’s leak of a draft Labour manifesto is that all eyes today have fallen on what was missing from the draft: the costings. There is a very big assumption in Labour’s figures: that when you raise taxes you get all the extra revenue that you would expect to receive. The reality,
Today Jeremy Corbyn launched Labour’s 2017 manifesto in Bradford. Given that the draft version of the document leaked last week, a lot of the contents haven’t come as a surprise. However, there are still a few significant things to note from the 124-page document: Labour have not factored in the cost of nationalisation into their
Labour have this morning launched their manifesto for the election. A big part of being the leader of a political party is that you meet people across the country and hear a wide range of views and ideas about the future. For me, it’s been a reminder that our country is a place of dynamic,
Happy Labour manifesto day. The party has decamped to Bradford for its official manifesto launch. Aside from bashing the Tories, Jeremy Corbyn has announced a number of new policies — from raising income tax for high earners to scrapping tuition fees. However, it’s another message that has caught Mr S’s attention. In the backdrop to
One of the complaints that allies of Jeremy Corbyn often issue is that his critics – whether in his own party, the media, the Tory party or the general electorate – tend to focus on the man, not his policies. His policies are, those allies argue, actually very popular with voters — when you test
Well, this is going well. In less than two hours Labour will launch its 2017 manifesto and John McDonnell has already got things off to a bad start with a questionable appearance on the Today programme. Aside from praising the decision by Labour’s new election aide Andrew Murray to trade the Communist party for the
Can we please stop pretending this is a normal election? Everyone’s at it. Gabbing about NHS funding, arguing over energy price caps. Everyone’s acting as if it’s 2015, or 2010, or any other election year of the modern period, when mildly right-wing parties and mildly left-wing parties argued the toss over fairly technical matters and
Édouard Philippe is the perfect fit to be Emmanuel Macron’s Premier Minister. A one-time Socialist who then switched to the centre-right Les Républicains, the 46-year-old mirrors the ambiguity of his president. Philippe has been the mayor of the northern port town of Le Havre since 2010 and the region’s MP for the last five years.
Ah, Chelsea. Or in my case, ah, Tatton. It’s that time of year again when the Royal Horticultural Society revs up for its slew of annual flower shows, allowing us green-fingered enthusiasts the chance to seek out the lesser-spotted Titchmarsh and the perennially pleasing Monty Don. It’s also a good time to do an inventory of our
There’s bad news for households this morning following the news that inflation has soared to its highest level since September 2013. According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), inflation is now at 2.7 per cent, up from 2.3 per cent in March. This is some way above the Bank of England’s stated 2 per
I see that the UK’s Lucie Jones has blamed her Eurovision Song Contest failure upon Brexit. Lucie actually came fifteenth, which was substantially higher than either she or the song deserved. Her song, ‘Never Gonna Give Up On You’, or some such egregious, banal, tripe, was a hugely boring ballad without even the redemption of
Never mind Eurovision. For Germany, the state election in North Rhine Westphalia on Sunday was the big one – the best indication of how Germans will vote in their national election in four months time. The result was a ‘political earthquake’ according to German media – a humiliation for Martin Schulz’s Social Democrats, and a spectacular
Over the past few weeks, Theresa May has toured the country meeting a carefully curated audience of Tory supporters. This has helped to cultivate the idea that Theresa May’s Team are incredibly popular across the land. Today, CCHQ changed the formula and the Prime Minister met with non-vetted members of the public, on the campaign trail
I can understand why Theresa May should want to toy with the idea of having ‘workers’ representatives on board’. As with Tony Blair and his promise to be tough on crime, and David Cameron and gay marriage, it has become a tradition in modern-day elections that a party campaigning from a position of strength makes
Theresa May has been continuing her UK-wide tour to convince voters in all corners of the country to back the Conservatives. This weekend saw the Tory campaign machine make a whistle stop tour in Belfast. The Prime Minister attended a local agricultural show and talked to farmers and families about why they must support the party. So
Usually in a general election campaign, MPs in marginal seats invite high profile party figures to their constituencies in a bid to generate interest from the local media and win over swing voters. This is certainly what’s happening when it comes to the Tory campaign — from Theresa May downwards, Conservative ministers have been busy touring
Nicholas Soames may be MP to one of the safest Conservative seats in the country — with a majority of 24,286 — but that doesn’t mean the Tory grandee is taking anything for granted. Winston Churchill’s grandson has been snapped out on the campaign trail — travelling by horse, natch: https://twitter.com/Tim_R_Dawson/status/864093380028100610 No doubt the horse
I don’t normally glean insights for my personal finance columns from police dramas on TV, honest. Recently, though, I caught up with series one of Line of Duty. One of the plotlines explored the middle-class money dilemma of our time: how much a good parent should shell out for their kids. A decent officer was
Michael Fallon – We warned the NHS on cyber security Early this morning, Andrew Marr interviewed the Defence Secretary Michael Fallon. Marr attacked the government for failing to adequately prepare for Friday’s mass cyber attack, which caused havoc in the NHS, creating many difficulties and rescheduled appointments up and down the country: Marr: What patently
Oh dear. With Rebecca Long-Bailey widely touted as Jeremy Corbyn’s far-left successor, the Labour MP will be hoping to use this election campaign to show that she’s got what it takes to lead a party. So, it was a curious decision by Long-Bailey to appear on today’s Sunday Politics but refuse to answer any questions.
With less than four weeks to go until polling day, tensions are running high between politicians from the two main parties. On the Andrew Marr Show, Michael Fallon and Emily Thornberry came to blows over Jeremy Corbyn’s links to the IRA. When the Defence Secretary criticised Corbyn on this issue, the shadow foreign secretary hit back
Why do Conservative politicians love Ronseal so much? Theresa May tells today’s Sunday Times that the Ronseal slogan – ‘it does what it says on the tin’ – is her ‘political philosophy’. David Cameron spent years talking about Britain’s yearning for ‘a kind of Ronseal politics’, before describing the Coalition government as operating according to the
Are Leavers thicker than Remainers? The short answer is: yes. At least, on average. That’s according to a paper analysing voters on both sides of the godawful Brexit referendum, which says that: ‘When compared with Remain voters, Leave voters displayed significantly lower levels of numeracy, reasoning and appeared more reliant on impulsive ‘System 1’ thinking.’ Now
Jeremy Corbyn wants to put up income tax only for people who earn more than £80,000 a year, he says. Anyone below that figure is safe. This reminds me of John Smith’s ‘shadow Budget’ in the 1992 general election. Smith said that the top rate of income tax would rise to 50 per cent for
I have been called every name under the sun by a great many people since my defence of Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger was published in the Spectator on Thursday. Naturally, most of the abuse has been online, but a little came my way on more traditional media. A caller to BBC Radio Ulster, for example,
After a tricky week for Jeremy Corbyn and his team, the party hopes to refocus its efforts on Labour’s official manifesto launch this week. But Mr S fears a new hire to Corbyn’s election team could distract from the message. Mr S understands Unite chief of staff Andrew Murray is being drafted in to help with the final stages of Labour’s
Theresa May’s return to Downing Street on the morning of 9 June will surprise no-one, but there is one thing political commentators will be left to puzzle over: just why did the Liberal Democrats do so badly? Tim Farron’s party should be big winners in this general election. If not matching the 62 seats they
Nothing better sums up middle-class millennials’ sense of entitlement than their demand that they be paid for interning. ‘Paid internships now!’ has become the rallying cry of young media people and the Twitterati and now the Labour Party, too. Its throwback manifesto, leaked this week, promises to ‘ban unpaid internships’, on the basis that ‘it’s