Boris johnson

Thursday

Andy Cowper

Boris faces a painful choice over social care

If social care reform were any deeper in the long grass of political priorities, it’d probably get mistaken for a hedgerow. It got a one-line reference in the Queen’s Speech this week, which does not even guarantee that the ‘clear plan’ promised by the PM in his first speech in the job will be published this year. Announcing ‘a long-term plan for social care reform this year’ has been a quaint annual government ritual since 2017. The Queen’s Speech also mentioned the need to clear the NHS backlog. Delays for treatment, already widespread before Covid-19 due to a decade of NHS funding increases lagging behind demand, are now the worst since

Andrew Tettenborn

Boris’s animal rights laws could come back to bite him

Boris Johnson wants to beef up animal rights. The new rules will include a ban on importing stuffed heads as hunting trophies, and possibly on fur as well; a mandatory microchip for every cat in the kingdom; no more exports of live animals for slaughter; a ban on keeping primates as pets; and, most bizarre of all, a law requiring government to accept that animals are sentient and feel pain and angst like the rest of us. This looks odd. There was no extensive pressure except from a small fringe for any of these measures. To most traditional conservatives, animal rights conjure up unattractive visions of young men in dirty

Wednesday

Katy Balls

A Tory rebellion is brewing against planning reforms

Boris Johnson used the Queen’s Speech on Tuesday to set out the policy reform he plans to do now that the pandemic is easing. This was largely centred on attempting to flesh out the ‘level up’ agenda through a focus on skills, industry and planning reform. It’s the latter bill that poses the greatest risk. Already Tory MPs have come out in opposition to what ministers say will be the biggest shake-up of the planning system in over 70 years. The government hopes the relaxation of the rules will pave the way for a home-building boom that will help it hit its goal of 300,000 new homes per year, ease

Tuesday

Robert Peston

Why a Covid public inquiry could prove useful for Boris

The Prime Minister said today there would be a ‘full proper public inquiry’ into the government’s handling of the Covid-19 crisis. This is highly significant, because a ‘full, proper public inquiry’ means one led by a judge and with witnesses represented by lawyers. I am also told – though Downing Street is refusing to comment on this – that the Cabinet will be asked by the Prime Minister to approve the terms of the inquiry on Wednesday morning, and there could be an announcement shortly afterwards. Such a public inquiry – like Leveson’s into hacking and Chilcot’s into the decision to go to war in Iraq – would take many years

Will Heaven

How Boris’s planning revolution can keep Nimbys on side

There is a basic political idea behind the Planning Bill announced in the Queen’s Speech. When you build a house, someone buys it – and when they do, they tend to start voting Conservative. The Bill’s aim is to get more houses built, 300,000 a year by the mid 2020s, helping to create millions more homeowners over the next decade and bringing long-term dividends to the Conservative party. The data supports this idea: House of Commons Library research shows that at the 2019 general election, 57 per cent of voters who owned their home outright voted Conservative, as did 43 per cent of people with mortgages. Renters, both private and social,

Brendan O’Neill Brendan O’Neill

A ‘cautious cuddle’? No thanks, Boris

There have been some truly dystopian spectacles during the past year-or-so of lockdowns. Cops using drones to spy on dog-walkers. Park benches sealed off with yellow tape. Curtain-twitchers dialling 999 after seeing the bloke next door go for a cheeky second jog. But this headline surely tops all of that: ‘Hugs will finally be legal again from next Monday.’ Read that again. We live in a country in which the government has accrued so much power that it now gets to tell us when we may hug each other. This should send a chill down the spines of all who care for liberty. To be honest, I wasn’t even aware

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Does No. 10 really have a plan for social care?

Is the government ever going to reform social care? After a lengthy row between No. 10 and the Treasury, the Queen’s speech does include a promise that ‘proposals on social care reform will be brought forward.’ The stand-off wasn’t just over how much those proposals will cost, but the design itself. Perhaps this is why the briefing accompanying the speech is so very light on what the government plans to do. All we know is that the Health and Care Bill ‘will include provisions to improve the oversight of how social care is commissioned and delivered, and facilitate greater integration between health and care services by placing Integrated Care Systems

Nick Tyrone Nick Tyrone

Sadiq Khan’s victory is good news for the Tories

Sadiq Khan is here to stay. London’s mayor has suggested he wants to stay on until 2040. But is this really good news for Labour? Or might the Tories be quietly pleased that Khan beat Shaun Bailey? In the coming years, one of Khan’s tasks will be to go cap in hand to the government asking for money. Transport for London (TfL), which Khan is in charge of, is in dire financial straits. TfL is desperate for cash: its fare revenues have collapsed by 90 per cent since the pandemic took hold. Even as commuters start to return to offices, London’s transport network will need money to stay afloat. But when Khan inevitably comes

Monday

Kate Andrews

Hugging gets the green light

The next stage of the roadmap is set to go ahead. At tonight’s No. 10 press conference, Boris Johnson announced from next Monday, 17 May, groups of up to six (or two households) can meet indoors, while up to 30 people will be able to meet up outside. Face coverings in school classrooms will be scrapped, and there will no longer be a cap on the number of people attending a funeral. Indoor hospitality can reopen, including restaurants and pubs, while hotels, cinemas and theatres can also open their doors, albeit with social distancing still in place. The one-metre plus rule means that while many may start to feel like

Melanie McDonagh Melanie McDonagh

Boris should be ashamed of his treatment of Shaun Bailey

What with all the excitement about Hartlepool and the understandable fuss about Scotland, there’s one aspect of the elections that seems to have passed everyone by, and that’s the result of the mayoral contest in London.  You may have missed it: Sadiq Khan won, with 1.2 million votes. But the Tory candidate, Shaun Bailey, did really unexpectedly well, with 977,601 votes. In some constituencies in outer London, he beat Sadiq comfortably; in other central London areas, he ran him really close, leaving the most predictably metrosexual or Corbynite areas to give Sadiq his majority. So Bailey got not far off a million votes. Just think what he might have done

Patrick O’Flynn Patrick O'Flynn

Starmer is Labour’s Iain Duncan Smith

After a gruelling election campaign the most important thing to do is to have a rest and have a think. Everyone is exhausted and things done in the heat of the moment are liable to be ill-considered. During my own brief time in electoral politics, I learned this the hard way. I played a leading role in an idiotic falling out at the top of Ukip after it secured almost four million votes but just one seat in the 2015 general election. A more seasoned colleague went on holiday and later described to me how he had watched the unedifying feuding unfold on a smartphone from his balcony while sipping gin

Saturday

James Forsyth

Can the UK government navigate the SNP’s calls for a second referendum?

The Unionist tactical voting in Scotland makes it tempting to see the country as split down the middle between pro-independence and anti-independence voters. But this is not quite right. There is a good argument that the Scottish electorate is actually split three ways between Unionists, Nationalists and those who aren’t fully decided on the constitutional question. It is this third group who will determine the result of any second referendum. So, the UK government has to have them in mind when thinking about how to handle the inevitable request for a Section 30 order and a second referendum. The first thing to say is that the UK government should ensure

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Scots, not Boris Johnson, are blocking IndyRef2

So what does it all mean? The first thing to bear in mind is that more than one thing may be true at the same time. This is, then, both a historic and thumping victory for Nicola Sturgeon and a mild disappointment. Historic because, after 14 years in power, Scottish voters have handed the SNP a fourth consecutive term in office; a modest disappointment because the SNP made little progress on their 2016 performance. Five years ago, Sturgeon lost the majority – albeit this was an accidental majority – she inherited from Alex Salmond and she failed to regain it this week. Doing so would have required everything to fall

Steven Fielding

Keir Starmer can’t afford to wait for the Tories to defeat themselves

‘We’re trapped between the two worlds,’ said a Labour worker during the last days of the party’s ill-fated Hartlepool by-election campaign. She meant Labour was strapped for cash, lacking the many small donations that came with Jeremy Corbyn and the big donors who backed Tony Blair. Her comment, however, had a wider relevance. In trying to keep hold of younger, middle-class metropolitan voters who already supported Labour while also attracting back older, small town working-class voters who have abandoned the party over recent elections, the various contests held on Thursday showed Keir Starmer was unable to do either. With the Brexit divide still reinforcing ongoing demographic trends that have seen

Friday

Ross Clark

Boris shouldn’t take the red wall vote for granted

There are two popular reactions to the Hartlepool by-election, which one you favour depending largely on your political tribe. The first holds that the white working class has reacted against a woke, metropolitan Labour party and its knee-taking leader, Keir Starmer. The second holds that the town’s racist and xenophobic population are still fearful that their beloved Brexit might yet be undone, and were desperate to vote against a Labour candidate who had backed Remain. Both of these narratives in fact boil down to pretty much the same thing: that the people of Hartlepool are a sad and angry bunch who tend to vote against things rather than vote for

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Tories win Hartlepool, throwing Starmer’s leadership into crisis

The Tories have taken Hartlepool on a remarkable 16 per cent swing from Labour. The Tories saw the biggest increase — 23 per cent — in a governing party’s share of the vote in a by-election in the post-war era. Labour has been trounced in a seat that has been theirs since its creation in 1974. Labour’s defeat shows that Keir Starmer is nowhere near stopping the party’s bleeding in the red wall. It suggests that the 2019 election was not a freak result driven by voters’ desire to get Brexit done and their fear of Jeremy Corbyn but rather part of a realignment of English politics — and that

Thursday

Matthew Parris

Who regulates the regulators?

This isn’t about David Cameron and Greensillgate; it isn’t about Boris Johnson and wallpapergate or Jennifer-Arcurigate. It isn’t about Westferrygate and the illegal planning approval (later reversed) given to a big Tory donor by the responsible minister (Robert Jenrick) for that grotesque development. Nor about Mr Jenrick’s department’s awards under the Towns Fund, which the public accounts select committee found had ‘every appearance of being politically motivated’. Nor is it about (Lord) Edward Lister and the late Sir Jeremy Heywood and twohatsgate, nor about Len McCluskey, Joe Anderson, Paul Flanagan and Flanagangate in Liverpool. Some of these men (the last two) have been the subject of police inquiries and one

Isabel Oakeshott

Bad news, Boris – childcare has cost me £500,000 (and counting)

Has Boris Johnson only just discovered the ruinous cost of childcare in this country? He has, allegedly, been seeking a rich donor to pay for a nanny for his one-year-old son Wilfred. What’s surprising is not that the Prime Minister has apparently told friends he needs £300,000 a year to keep on top of his outgoings (life gets expensive when you have multiple dependents and properties), but that he has only now realised the cost of finding someone to look after his son. And how even a dual-income couple will struggle. Especially in London. I should know: I have been paying for full-time childcare for almost 14 years. For the

The Spectator

Data, not dates: there is no reason to delay a return to normal life

A slogan can come back to haunt you. For Boris Johnson, the words ‘data not dates’ sounded powerful at a time when Covid cases were high and hospitals full. The idea was that the government would be guided by scientific reason, would respond to the figures and would not let rigid targets dictate policy. Since the Prime Minister announced his roadmap at the end of February, however, ‘dates’ seem to have become far more important than ‘data’. How can he claim to be following the data when he will not budge from a timeline which now looks like it was designed for a different phase of the pandemic? Why were

Ralph Ward-Jackson

In Hartlepool, I’m aiming for a noble defeat

By the time you read this you may know if the Tories triumphed in the Hartlepool by-election — or if, in the end, the party was too badly wounded by all that business about who paid for whose wallpaper. Boris Johnson visited the town more times than he visited Scotland in the campaign, so he certainly sensed victory. But who can predict elections nowadays? One thing, alas, is all but certain: I will have lost. I decided to stand as an independent candidate at the last minute, motivated by how much I loathe the apparatchiks at both main parties’ London HQs — disconnected, mediocre and disdainful. Just look at their