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.
15 min listen
The fallout from the riots continues as the numbers being processed by the justice system have led to emergency measures being triggered by the government. What does this mean and, given the prison system was at breaking point even before the riots, what happens next? Also on the podcast, the six Tory leadership contenders have
11 min listen
Less than 48 hours after Transport Secretary Louise Haigh hailed a new deal with train drivers… the rail union Aslef announced further strike action. So what happened to Labour’s ‘relationship reset’ with the unions? And with recent pay deals, what incentive is there for workers to compromise with the government? Fraser Nelson and Isabel Hardman
Piet Oudolf’s long borders at Wisley were worn out. The famous designer had in fact become a bit embarrassed by them: they’d done well for 20 years but in that time his own style had evolved – and so had people’s tastes. Oudolf is now such a household name that his pointillist landscaping is considered
Synchronised swimming isn’t really a sport, is it? It’s ‘artistic swimming’ now, of course, though many athletes don’t like that term precisely because it makes the Olympic event sound less like a real sport. But by the end of Swimming Pretty, Vicki Valosik’s meticulous history of synchronised swimming, it’s difficult to think of it as
13 min listen
Kemi Badenoch is the favourite in the Tory leadership race at the moment, which is partly why she’s been subject to a fair amount of scrutiny and some mud-slinging this week. But could Robert Jenrick actually overtake her as the frontrunner on the right of the Conservative party? Cindy Yu talks to Katy Balls and
A much bigger story than Rachel Reeves cancelling the winter fuel payment is her announcement today that she is finally killing off the beleaguered cap on social care costs. Reeves told the Commons that the Conservative government had not funded its reforms to social care, so they weren’t going to happen. She said: Adult social
The government has offered junior doctors a pay rise worth up to 20 per cent over two years in a bid to end the strikes that have seriously hampered the NHS. Rachel Reeves is expected to confirm later today that the doctors have struck a deal with their ministers that will include a backdated rise
One of the big themes of Keir Starmer’s government could well end up being accountability in the public sector, which sounds boring until you look at examples of where that is sorely lacking. Take the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the NHS regulator. Today, Health Secretary Wes Streeting declared it ‘not fit for purpose’ after an
Another week, another Prime Minister’s Questions featuring Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak arguing across the Commons. Except, of course, the men had swapped sides, with Starmer taking his first session as prime minister, and they were – possibly for the first time ever – quite nice to each other. All the old grudge match lines
14 min listen
Three weeks in for the new government and we have had our first Labour rebellion. In a vote last night on an SNP amendments to axe the two child benefit cap, seven Labour MPs revolted and have subsequently lost the Labour whip. Parliament’s new awkward squad includes some familiar faces of the Labour left, such
Keir Starmer has laid down a marker by suspending seven Labour MPs from the whip. The question is: What sort of marker? Will it benefit the Prime Minister in the long run? It is not normal to suspend the whip from an MP for rebelling on a non-confidence matter. The two-child benefit cap is also
We know that the NHS is broken: Wes Streeting announced that it was now the official policy of this government when he entered the Department of Health and Social Care. Today he had a chance to elaborate on just what exactly he thought was broken – and of course to point the finger at who
Labour are now making daily pronouncements on the latest policy area where the last government left things in a worse state than it let on. The latest is immigration. Yvette Cooper came to the Commons this afternoon to make a statement on border security. Even though she is now the Home Secretary, she sounded strikingly
If you wanted an idea of where the noisiest opposition to Keir Starmer’s government will come, the list of amendments to the King’s Speech is pretty handy. As I reported last week, there are a lot of amendments on the two-child benefit cap from different groups. The Greens have got one, independent MP Shockat Adam
Keir Starmer used his press conference at the end of the European Political Community summit to further cement his narrative that the Tories have broken everything and that the situation is much worse than he had thought before entering government. This line is, Labour strategists believe, essential to the party having a chance of securing
At what point does a minister decide they are being lied to? That was the question Pat McFadden and Ed Davey had to consider as they gave evidence to the Post Office Inquiry. Both were confronted with evidence of Post Office figures assuring them nothing was wrong when subpostmasters and their MPs were raising concerns
When Rishi Sunak was prime minister, he often appeared merely to be commentating on events, rather than in charge of them. Perhaps that is why he looks so comfortable as leader of the opposition now. He has been giving very good speeches since losing the election, and both he and his party look rather relieved
Keir Starmer has tried to stave off a revolt on the two-child benefit cap by announcing a child poverty taskforce. The Prime Minister told the Commons that the taskforce would ‘devise a strategy to drive the numbers down’, and that it would not just focus on one policy area. He was responding to an intervention
The big theme of today’s King’s Speech is ‘mission-led’ government, with economic growth, house building, workers’ rights and devolution the key elements. King Charles told the House of Lords that ‘taken together these policies will enhance Britain’s position as a leading industrial nation and enable the country to take advantage of new opportunities that can
13 min listen
Keir Starmer is coming under pressure to commit to scrapping the two-child benefit cap, introduced in 2017 by the Conservatives. Plaid Cymru, the Greens, Nigel Farage, the SNP, and now some Labour backbenchers are all calling for its removal. Can Starmer hold the line? Elsewhere: in Wales, First Minister Vaughan Gething has resigned after four
