James Heale

James Heale

James Heale is The Spectator’s political correspondent.

Are the SNP exploiting Labour woes?

13 min listen

The SNP presented their budget this week in Holyrood with the news that all pensioners would receive a winter fuel allowance and a pledge to scrap the two-child benefit cap. Questions remain about how they will make this budget work financially, but it is clear that they have one eye on the 2026 Scottish Parliament

Is immigration not a priority for Labour?

12 min listen

There is a feeling of deja-vu in Westminster today as Keir Starmer unveiled his plan for change and six ‘milestones’ (not pledges) to turn the country around. They are: raising living standards in every part of the UK; rebuilding Britain with 1.5 million homes and fast-tracking planning decisions on major infrastructure projects; ending hospital backlogs

Is Starmer planning a foreign policy reset too?

18 min listen

Keir Starmer is preparing to give his big reset speech on Thursday. But the more interesting address is perhaps the one he gave last night at the annual Lord Mayor’s Banquet, where the Prime Minister gave his first major speech on foreign policy. The most interesting passage saw Starmer reject the notion that Britain will

James Heale

Why the Welsh Tory leader has quit

Andrew RT Davies has quit this lunchtime as the leader of the Conservative group in the Welsh parliament. It follows a confidence vote among the 16 Tory Senedd Members (MSs) who narrowly voted by nine to seven to keep him on as leader. With the group split how best to proceed, Davies has opted to

James Heale

Is Starmer planning a foreign policy reset too?

Keir Starmer is preparing to give his big reset speech on Thursday. But the more interesting address is perhaps the one he gave last night. The annual Lord Mayor’s Banquet was the setting for the Prime Minister to give his first major speech on foreign policy since entering No. 10. The most interesting passage saw

Labour risks death by consultation

After 14 years in opposition, you might have expected Labour to come into government bursting with plans for Britain. Yet the first four months of the Starmer supremacy have seen ministers commission a glut of various reviews, consultations and task forces about what they should actually do in office. Helpfully, Sky News has compiled a

James Heale

Sir Chris Wormald is the new cabinet secretary

Keir Starmer has today resolved one of his longstanding headaches: who to appoint to lead the civil service. The man chosen to replace Simon Case as cabinet secretary is Sir Chris Wormald. The 56-year-old has served as permanent secretary of the Department of Health since 2016, leading colleagues throughout the ups and downs of the

James Heale

Is Keir Starmer turning into Rishi Sunak?

11 min listen

The government is trailing a major policy speech ahead of Thursday, in which the Prime Minister will set out key ‘milestones’ that he wants to hit, in terms of healthcare, living standards, the climate and so on. It’s all sounding a little like a previous prime minister… Cindy Yu talks to Katy Balls and James

Assisted dying bill passes second reading – what next?

14 min listen

The controversial assisted dying bill has passed its second reading in the House of Commons with a majority of 55 after just hours of debate. It now heads to committee stage for further scrutiny. What does the bill’s passing at this stage mean for its likelihood of eventually becoming law? And will Labour’s front bench

James Heale

Louise Haigh’s resignation raises questions for Keir Starmer

11 min listen

In the small hours of this morning Louise Haigh resigned as Transport Secretary following the revelation that she had pleaded guilty to a criminal offence in 2014. Haigh admitted fraud by false representation at a magistrates’ court after she incorrectly told the police that a work mobile had been stolen in 2013. She was then

Transport Secretary admits to fraud conviction

In recent years, Labour has made great political hay out of allegations of rule-breaking. The party was never slow to criticise Boris Johnson’s government for breaches of lockdown, with Sir Keir keen to depict himself as ‘Mr Rules.’ So it is sub-optimal, to say the least, that a senior minister has tonight admitted pleading guilty

James Heale

Starmer attacks ‘open border’ Tories

Anyone else want to do a Westminster press conference? Keir Starmer made it a hat-trick this afternoon when he gave his reply to the new immigration figures, following Kemi Badenoch’s comments yesterday and Nigel Farage’s response this morning. The Prime Minister’s team gave it the full No. 10 treatment: the flags, the lectern, Starmer looking

James Heale

Reform hits 100,000 members

There was a business-like manner in Nigel Farage’s response to the news that net migration was more than 900,000 in 2023. Speaking this morning at a Mayfair press conference, Farage was almost flat in his reply on the ‘horrendous’ figures. He insisted that the Tories would ‘never be forgiven’ for presiding over a nine-fold increase

James Heale

David Cameron u-turns on assisted dying

David Cameron has today become the first former prime minister to come out in support of assisted dying, having previously signalled his opposition to it in 2015. In a piece for the Times, he says that: ‘My main concern and reason for not supporting proposals before now has always been the worry that vulnerable people

James Heale

Why Reform has Wales in its sights

A spectre is haunting Wales. Fresh from Reform’s election victories in Westminster, Nigel Farage is turning his attention westwards, to Cardiff Bay. He wants Reform to replace the Tories there as the main challenge to Labour in May 2026, creating a major platform for his party ahead of the 2029 general election. The man plotting

Kemi’s first policy proclamation

12 min listen

Kemi Badenoch has signalled that she could change her position on the ECHR. At a conference today, she said “we will review every policy, treaty and part of our legal framework – including the ECHR and the Human Rights Act.” What could this mean for the Conservatives going forward? Katy Balls discusses with Michael Gove

James Heale

Badenoch admits Tory migration failures

Of all the issues which did it for the Conservatives in July 2024, no issue deterred life-long Tories more than the failure to control migration. So it was appropriate then that this subject formed the basis of Kemi Badenoch’s first major policy speech since her election as leader. Ahead of tomorrow’s release of migration statistics,

James Heale

William Hague is the new Chancellor of Oxford

Congratulations to William Hague, who has today triumphed in the race to succeed Chris Patten and become the 168th Chancellor of Oxford. Hague, who topped the ballot at every stage, won the final run-off against Elish Angiolini by a margin of 1,600 votes. Former cabinet ministers Peter Mandelson and Dominic Grieve were both eliminated in the

Can Keir Starmer get Britain back to work?

10 min listen

The government have announced their latest effort to get Britons back into work. A series of benefit changes intend to tackle the fact that Britain is the only major economy where the employment rate has fallen over the past five years, largely because more people are out of work due to long-term ill health. Why