David cameron

The broadcasters have reportedly come up with a new set of proposals for the TV debates in order to force David Cameron to sign up. The Radio Times reports that they now want to hold one debate where the Prime Minister will face Ed Miliband, and two debates that feature almost everyone – Conservatives, Labour, the Lib Dems, the Greens, Ukip, SNP and Plaid Cymru. This doesn’t just answer Cameron’s stipulation that the Greens must be involved, but answers the next question that would then be posed, which is what about the nationalist parties. Unless he suddenly starts talking about the importance of George Galloway, the Prime Minister will find it

Who are the latest contenders in the Tory leadership battle and how much support do they have? That’s the question that Tory MPs and pundits love to chew over, even though there is no contest. The latest fixation is whether George Osborne has rowed behind the Boris campaign. James looked at this yesterday, revealing that Boris might quite fancy taking over from David Cameron after an EU referendum in 2017. Of course, the funny thing is that there isn’t a leadership contest because David Cameron is currently secure as Prime Minister. And as I explain in today’s Evening Standard, he could be secure for a while longer – where Tory

For most of this parliament, Downing Street has been thoroughly paranoid about Boris Johnson and his intentions. Any attempt by the Mayor to reach out to Tory MPs was met with deep suspicion. But now, the Tory leadership is actively pushing Boris to see Tory MPs — he was even invited to join the Whips for a Whips Supper at Boisdale last week. This is all evidence of the unspoken deal between Boris and the Tory leadership. He will be loyal and campaign hard for Cameron. In exchange, it will allow him to cultivate Tory MPs; helping him to rectify his biggest weakness ahead of any Tory leadership contest. These

David Cameron and Barack Obama have just finished giving a rather cutesy and extremely verbose press conference following the reinvigorating of their bromance/serious talks on the economy and counter-terrorism. The pair structured their opening statements to mirror one another, with each opening with a little tribute to the other. Obama said Cameron was a ‘great friend’ and ‘one of my closest and trusted partners in the world, while Cameron said Obama was a ‘great friend to Britain and to me personally’. A good friend indeed: Obama is basically doing everything he can to help Cameron be re-elected in this country. One of the most useful quotes is the one from the

Last Sunday, David Cameron marched through Paris in solidarity, so it seemed, with those who stand up for free speech. Anyone who thought he meant it must now be crying out, ‘Je suis un right Charlie!’ Hardly had the march finished than the Prime Minister had rediscovered his other side: the one which reacts to terror by threatening yet more surveillance, more state control. He has promised to revive, in the Conservative manifesto, the ‘-snooper’s charter’ which would allow the state to retain indefinitely information about every email we ever send, every telephone call we ever make. Not only that. He added a further measure: he wants to ban all

Last Sunday, David Cameron marched through Paris in solidarity, so it seemed, with those who stand up for free speech. Anyone who thought he meant it must now be crying out, ‘Je suis un right Charlie!’ Hardly had the march finished than the Prime Minister had rediscovered his other side: the one which reacts to terror by threatening yet more surveillance, more state control. He has promised to revive, in the Conservative manifesto, the ‘-snooper’s charter’ which would allow the state to retain indefinitely information about every email we ever send, every telephone call we ever make. Not only that. He added a further measure: he wants to ban all

David Cameron and George Osborne addressed Tory MPs this evening. The meeting was to update the Tory parliamentary party on the economy and its place in the party’s election strategy. Cameron told them that whatever the question was, the answer was that you can only have it with a strong economy and urged them to repeat this message as much as possible. He said, ‘Boring is good’. Addressing the assembled MPs, Osborne emphasised that the economy was the heart of this debate. He argued that this was first time since 1992 that Labour and the Tories had gone into an election with different spending planes. Most of the questions were

Why have the Conservatives left out immigration and the NHS – two of the three issues that voters consistently cite as the most important in forming their decision about who to back in the General Election – out of their list of six priorities? Among the deficit, jobs, taxes, education, housing and retirement there is no room for the health service, immigration or Europe: which also tend to be the things David Cameron and Ed Miliband fight most vehemently over at Prime Minister’s Questions. Labour is very pleased about this, and is pretending to be very cross that the Prime Minister is ignoring the NHS. Presumably Ukip will be similarly

I don’t always agree with Peter Hitchens but this is by far the best piece I’ve seen on the political reaction to the Paris attacks. As far as Cameron, Miliband and Clegg are concerned, we must all sign up to these shibboleths: The attack was nothing to do with Islam. Almost all Muslims, here and abroad, found those attacks repugnant. The attacks were perpetrated and supported by a minuscule number of people who can simply be defined as ‘terrorists’. Immigration and multiculturalism were in no way contributory causes of either the Paris attack or the attacks which we might experience in the future or have suffered in the past. All