Uk politics

Monday

Fraser Nelson

Balls’ new rules

It’s Ed Balls’ speech today, and he’s cleared it with Ed Miliband – a courtesy that Gordon Brown never extended to Tony Blair. He promises to introduce a new set of fiscal rules, which I’m sure will make the nation’s heart leap, given how well the last set of fiscal rules worked. But what jumps out at me is his pledge to use any money raised from flogging off the banks for deficit reduction, rather than a giveaway. Here’s what Balls is expected to say, ‘Even as bank shares are falling again, David Cameron and Nick Clegg are still betting on a windfall gain from privatising RBS and Lloyds to pay

Sunday

David Blackburn

Exploiting a conservative moment

Away from the resurrection of David Miliband, other Labour modernisers convened at the Progress rally earlier this evening. These weren’t just any old party hacks; they were grandees: Douglas Alexander, Tessa Jowell, Caroline Flint, Liam Byrne and Jacqui Smith to name a few: and the audience was reverential. They were discussing The Purple Book, the latest contribution to the debate about Labour’s future. The central thesis of the book is that the state is passé. As Jowell put it, “People are much more sceptical, much more hostile to the idea of the state spending their money on their behalf.” Jowell mentioned community, faith groups and the family as examples of structures

James Forsyth James Forsyth

For one night only, David Miliband returns

David Miliband was studiously loyal to his brother in his one speaking appearance at Labour conference. He told Movement for Change, the community organising group that he founded, that ‘Ed deserves huge praise’, that ‘Ed has led with purpose and conviction and that ‘we’ll all here because we want to put Ed into Downing Street’ But the brother over the water did come with three warning for Labour. The first was that ‘if Labour becomes a sectional party, we’ll never be elected to government.’ The second was that there’s ‘never been more distrust of the state across the industrialised world’ so if Labour becomes ‘a big state party, we’ll never

David Blackburn

A Labour attitude to Scotland

As a coda to James’ post on Labour’s attitude to Scotland and the Union, it’s worth relating this little snippet from Ivan Lewis MP at a fringe event earlier this evening. Lewis said that, despite the SNP’s current high-flying poll ratings and the need for Labour to learn lessons north of the border, “most Scots don’t want independence”. The upshot is that some in Labour think that the party will return to power in Scotland as a matter of course and minimal effort is required to reverse losses. Given the situation in Edinburgh, descibed so vividly by Hamish Macdonell, Lewis’ complacency is quite striking. 

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Labour spokesmen divided on whether they’ll campaign for the Union with Cameron

Douglas Alexander has just told Andrew Neil that he will campaign for Scotland to stay in the union with ‘anybody else who wants to join me’. This opens up a difference with Alexander’s normally close political ally, Jim Murphy. Murphy, Scottish Secretary in the last Labour government and currently shadow defence secretary, recently declared that he wouldn’t share a platform with David Cameron during any referendum campaign. When asked about this earlier in the day, Alexander said that he was more interested in making the argument about the value of the union rather than arranging the chairs. But Alexander does seem to hold a different position than Murphy on the

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Miliband: cuts are okay now

I’ve just caught up with Ed Miliband on Marr this morning (transcript here) and his aim seemed to be burying Ed Balls’ complaint about cuts being too fast and too deep. In its place, he called for more growth. Here’s my take on his interview: 1) He doesn’t complain about cuts.  “The basic message is this: we’ve got to cut the deficit, but the best and most important way of doing that is to grow our economy… A year ago there was a contested argument whether the government strategy should work. It’s not working.” You don’t hear him talk about Ed Balls’ “too hard, too fast” cuts, just a reference

James Forsyth James Forsyth

A preview of just how personal the Boris Ken struggle will be

If anyone had any doubts about just how personal the 2012 London mayoral campaign is going to be, they should have been dispelled by Ken Livingstone’s speech to Labour conference today. Ken claimed that the Mayor had ‘got what he wished for’ in above average unemployment and accused him of standing for a ‘privileged minority’. He then went on to draw an equivalence between Boris’s student antics and those of the rioters: “What is the difference between the rioters, and a gang of over-privileged arrogant students vandalising restaurants and throwing chairs through windows in Oxford? Come on Boris – what’s the moral difference between your Bullingdon vandalism as a student

David Blackburn

Labour’s tuition fee gambit

As James noted earlier this morning, Ed Miliband said that Labour may go further with its policy capping tuition fees when it reveals its manifesto later this parliament. Shadow universities minister John Denham has since said that a graduate tax remains the party’s long-term aspiration. Denham’s comments muddies the already dark waters on the issue: first Miliband opposed a hike in fees, now he seems to recognises that they must rise but should be capped, and at the same we’re told that the aspiration is a graduate tax. Liam Byrne has added a further confusion by saying that the top 10 per cent of graduates will pay “a little more”

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Miliband’s growing argument

Ed Miliband turned in a crisp performance on the Andrew Marr show this morning. If he is having media training, it is paying off. In a clear sign of where Labour’s economic policy is heading, he constantly stressed that growth was the key to getting the deficit down. But he was far less clear on how he would stimulate the economy beyond a proposed cut in VAT. Miliband was also asked about his proposal to cut tuition fees to £6,000. I’m not convinced by the politics of this move. It leaves fees in place and raises them from where they were under the last government which is hardly a radical change or

David Blackburn

Labour tries to make its mark

Global events may soon relegate Labour conference to the News in Brief sections of newspapers, especially as it appears that G20 finance ministers are preparing for Greece to default and for contagion to spread to other parts of the Eurozone. So, the Labour leader has wasted no time as Labour conference opens. In interviews with the Observer and the Sunday Mirror, he revives his tactic of presenting himself as an insurgent, the man to “rip up the rulebook”. He makes a pledge or two: the headline grabbing idea is a cap tuition fees at £6,000 per year, paid for by reversing a planned corporation tax cut on the hated banks. This blatant

Saturday

David Blackburn

Searching for an alternative

The Labour conference has started badly for Ed Miliband, with David Blunkett criticising the party for allowing the Tories to define the national economic debate. Blunkett was concurring with shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander’s view that the Tories had been successful in “framing a public language that made more sense of the economic crisis”. To be fair to Miliband, he made the same point in his recent interview with the New Statesman, but he is yet to provide a coherent or credible alternative to the government’s policies. So, inquiring eyes turn on Ed Balls (and today’s Mail relates another alleged tale of his part in our economic downfall). The shadow

David Blackburn

Medvedev clears the way for Putin

President Dmitri Medvedev has named his successor: one Vladimir Putin. Reports from Moscow say that Medvedev will step aside and support the man he succeeded in elections next March. This turn of events is not particularly surprising and Putin is a certain victor: as Pavel Stroilov revealed on Coffee House last week, Putin has been practicing that singularly Russian art of eliminating the opposition. Stroilov also warned Western governments against falling into Putin’s embrace. Russia is forecast to grow very quickly in the next 30-odd years, retaining its spot in the G7 according to PwC’s recent research paper, The World in 2050. Developed countries will covet those burgeoning resources; but,

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Hard Labour

The sense of unreality that hangs over party conference seems particularly heightened this year. As events outside roll on at a dramatic pace, the conferences try to proceed as normal. A new law on stalking may be necessary but it is small beer compared to the economic crisis gripping the Western world at the moment. Ed Miliband’s challenge in the next few days is two-fold. First, he has to work to restore Labour’s economic credibility—something that will be made even harder by today’s allegations about the role of his shadow Chancellor in the last government. Second, he has to show that the party gets the seriousness of this moment. Miliband,

David Blackburn

Osborne’s dire warning

This morning’s headlines are apocalyptic: “Global economy on the brink”, “Six weeks to save the Euro”, “Collective action needed now”. The unifying theme is the lack of leadership in the Eurozone: someone must grasp the nettle, say external politicians and commentators. Meanwhile, Charles Moore points out, with typical understatement, that Europe is leaderless by nature: no one is in charge and that is its tragedy. Moore doesn’t mention the European President, who could, conceivably, offer direction and insist on fiscal discipline; but Herbert Van Rompuy is yet to meet that challenge. You wonder if someone of Tony Blair’s international standing might have succeeded where Van Rompuy has so far failed. Perhaps, but Europe’s

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Read my lips: no new tax cuts

There are still rumours in Westminster that David Cameron will cut taxes to stimulate the economy, but the speech he gave to the Canadian parliament on Thursday rather scotches this idea. Here’s what jumped out at me 1) No Obama-style deficit-financed tax cuts, please, we’re British. “The economic situation is much more dangerous and the solution for most countries can not be simply to borrow more. Because if the government doesn’t have the room to borrow more in order to cut taxes or increase spending, people and markets start worrying about whether a government can actually pay back its debt. And when this happens confidence ebbs away and interest rates

Friday

Fraser Nelson

Is Osborne ready for the next crisis?

There is a strange pre-Lehman feeling in the air right now: the idea that something awful is going to happen, but no one knows what or when. This is laden with political ramifications. The problem for the Tories last time was not that George Osborne had been caught aboard HMS Deripaska. The greater problem was that a crash had arrived and the Shadow Chancellor had nothing to say. Brown, at least, seemed to have an agenda, and the Tory poll lead was reduced to one vulnerable point. I admire Osborne, but he can do far better in making the case for the government’s economic strategy. If there is a second

David Blackburn

Exorcising the devil…

Ed Miliband is busy trying to shift both his party and the centre ground to the left. To that end, he announced his support for the Palestinian bid for statehood, which, as Martin Bright notes, was an attempt to distance himself from the legacy of Blair, and to a lesser extent Brown, by supporting a definitively left-wing cause. The British Opposition’s view on Palestinian statehood is utterly immaterial to the Middle East peace process, so the announcement was merely a presentational ruse, a reminder that Miliband is unlikely to talk about substance until Liam Byrne has published the party’s policy review later this year. By chance, Liam Byrne has written an article

Daniel Korski

Texting times

After the education email furore earlier this week, discussions are underway in ministerial offices about private emails: are they subject to the freedom of information act? The answer is probably yes, which may not be what the government wants to hear. But the problems that this will cause are nothing compared to what might happen next, when attention moves on to text messages. Whitehall buzzes with texts: Ministers text SpAds; SpAds text journalists; journalists text ministers, and so on. Often the messages are short and inconsequential, but not always. There is the potential for even greater embarrassment than exists with emails.

David Blackburn

Ed of many colours

Philip Collins has an essential column in this morning’s Times (£), as a prelude to the Labour party conference. His theme is the many colours of Ed Miliband: he has been Red Ed, Blue Ed, Purple Ed, Green Ed and doubtless there will soon be Yellow Ed. Miliband has to be just one colour. Collins writes: ‘Take a bit of green, a bit of red, a bit of blue, a bit of yellow and a bit of purple, mix them all up in a big splodge and what do you get? You get Brown.’ The spectre of Brown evidently looms large in the minds of men like Collins, for whom the

David Blackburn

Corporatism, comms and civil servants

David Cameron renewed his calls for global action for growth last night and it seems that the work begins at home. The Times reports (£) that 50 of Britain’s largest companies will be given direct access to ministers and officials. Corporate bodies will be designated an “account director”, who, despite what that title might suggest, is a cabinet minister rather than a junior advertising exec. The scheme is not yet finalised, but it seems that the labour will be divided thus: ‘Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, will act as what officials are calling “an account director” to Britain’s oil and gas giants Shell, BP and BG. David Willetts, the Universities and