Isabel Hardman is assistant editor of The Spectator and author of Why We Get the Wrong Politicians. She also presents Radio 4’s Week in Westminster.
From our UK edition
If Theresa May wants to have a public row with Sajid Javid, the Culture Secretary doesn’t seem particularly keen on continuing it. He tried his best to avoid jumping into a war of words with the Home Secretary, whose leaked correspondence warning that his plan to make mobile phone companies fill in ‘not-spots’ (areas with
From our UK edition
Ed Balls had two great lines of attack today at Treasury questions, but didn’t really manage to get any traction with either. He started his stint in the Chamber by trying once again to push the Chancellor on when the Treasury knew about the ‘surprise’ £1.7 billion EU bill, then moved on to the Conservatives’
From our UK edition
The Tories have now accepted they’ve got a much worse chance of winning the Rochester by-election than they claimed they initially did. The plan now is to factor in a victory to the political narrative so the result doesn’t cause as much trouble when it does come, and to whittle down Mark Reckless’s majority so
From our UK edition
Lynne Featherstone is to return to the Home Office to replace Norman Baker as Minister of State for Crime Prevention, Nick Clegg has announced. This is interesting because Damian Green named Featherstone as one of the ministers who worked effectively rather than caused trouble. The minister herself said this afternoon that she has ‘always had
From our UK edition
David Cameron promised that the European Arrest Warrant vote would be held before the Rochester by-election on 20 November, but so far no date has been set. I now hear that the government plans to hold the vote next Monday. Nothing has been confirmed, and won’t be until tomorrow night. The size of the rebellion
From our UK edition
What does Norman Baker’s exit from the Home Office tell us about the coalition? In many ways, the situation in that department was quite unlike any other, but if another Lib Dem does fancy going in a blaze of fury, then Justice Minister Simon Hughes was assigned to his department for similar trouble-making reasons, and
From our UK edition
Anyone surprised by the revelation that workers manufacturing those expensive Fawcett Society/Whistles T-shirts are paid just 62p per hour will probably get a nasty shock if they research the origins of the clothes in their own wardrobes. That’s why it’s a little hard to pass judgement on Ed Miliband, Nick Clegg and Harriet Harman for
From our UK edition
4.50pm – It is difficult to see how Fiona Woolf can stay on as chair of the child abuse inquiry. Labour has decided to call for her resignation, with Yvette Cooper this afternoon saying: ‘Theresa May has put Fiona Woolf in an impossible position. We had hoped the Home Secretary would be able to sort
From our UK edition
Labour has won the South Yorkshire Police and Crime Commissioner by-election with 50 per cent of the vote, which is a tremendous relief for the party given the circumstances in which this contest was held. It avoided the contest moving to second preferences by 0.02 per cent, but it has won in every local authority
From our UK edition
Tory MPs are in Oxfordshire today for an ‘away day’. It’s supposed to focus on the autumn statement, but Tory MPs also want to make a few points about the Prime Minister’s immigration policies (read Fraser’s Telegraph column on the problems with aping Ukip) and others want to complain about the Coalition continuing when the
From our UK edition
According to an email I received earlier this afternoon, I should be worried about the mental state of someone I know. An alert popped up in my inbox from an app called ‘Radar‘ which the Samaritans launched this week, telling me a tweet from someone I followed might suggest they were contemplating suicide. Here’s the
From our UK edition
Just to make Scottish Labour’s misery complete – and underline the case for a bold leader who likes winning things – STV have published a poll by Ipsos Mori putting Ed Miliband’s party on just 23 per cent, which would see them losing all but four of their Scottish MPs, against 52 per cent support
From our UK edition
As expected, Jim Murphy has announced he’s standing for Scottish Labour Leader. He’s given an interview to the Daily Record in which he says he wants to stop ‘the Scottish Labour Party from committing self harm’: ‘I think it is time for a fresh start for the Scottish Labour party,” he said. “I am proud
From our UK edition
Why did David Cameron set the vote for the European Arrest Warrant for before the Rochester and Strood by-election? It seems to be a way of picking a right-wing sore just at the wrong time. Perhaps he felt bounced into doing it at Prime Minister’s Questions. But those involved in the rebellion think it could
From our UK edition
Ed Miliband chose one of his medleys of things that have gone wrong for today’s Prime Minister’s Questions. There were plenty of those to choose from, and the Labour leader started with the almighty row in the Tory party over the European Arrest Warrant. He accused David Cameron of delaying the vote because of the
From our UK edition
Privately, the Conservatives are probably not particularly surprised about the demise of Bob Neill’s EU referendum bill, this time at the hands of the Liberal Democrats. It was always a Downing Street ruse to help quell backbench rebellion and senior Tories have ever since viewed the progress both of this bill and its predecessor, led
From our UK edition
Before the by-election battle with Ukip in Rochester that Westminster is rather obsessed with, there’s another chance for Nigel Farage’s party to cause a political earthquake. Tomorrow, voters in South Yorkshire will go to the polls to elect a new police and crime commissioner to replace Shaun Wright, who eventually resigned after the Rotherham child
From our UK edition
Nick Boles has a habit of making explosive interventions and then disappearing from political debate for a little while after an almighty telling off from Number 10. Tonight he may be planning to lay low for a while, because he’s probably wanted for causing another big row. The Skills Minister has told Total Politics magazine
From our UK edition
Liam Fox has launched a series of ‘One Minute Fox’ videos in which he sets out his position on various hot issues from the threat of fundamentalism to welfare reform. He unveiled the series – which he says will become more controversial as the election approaches – to a group of Conservative MPs this evening. Intriguingly, none
From our UK edition
The main business of the day in the House of Commons is Labour’s debate on Lord Freud, a row that blew up nearly a fortnight ago. The party’s motion, entitled ‘Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Welfare Reform and disabled people’, finishes with ‘. . . this House has no confidence in the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for