John Connolly

For Keir Starmer, it seems everything is going south. His MPs are openly rebelling, his advisers are mutinous and it often feels as though he can’t decide whether to run the country as human-rights-lawyer-in-chief or as Nigel Farage-lite. It’s no wonder that some in his party are beginning to look north for an answer to the party’s woes – specifically to Manchester, where Andy Burnham increasingly looks like the King over the river Irwell. With the government trapped in an ideological Bermuda triangle, Greater Manchester suggests there is a way out – a way for Labour to govern effectively.

Keir Starmer may have survived his meeting with Donald Trump yesterday – with the President saying he was ‘inclined’ to support the Chagos deal and might not impose tariffs on the UK – but it appears the US President still has plenty of concerns about the state of this country. Speaking to The Spectator’s Ben Domenech yesterday, the President was asked what he thought about our new Prime Minister. While Trump conceded that ‘He’s different. Different type’ to Boris Johnson (which may well go down as understatement of the year) he was generally positive about Sir Keir, saying ‘I have to say, he was very nice. We had a very good meeting.’ But policy differences remain.

After weeks of negotiations, a hostage deal has been struck between Israel and Hamas. Under the terms of the deal, Hamas will release 50 of the women and children it kidnapped on 7th October in exchange for a four-day ceasefire. In return, Israel will release 150 Palestinians from its prisons. Substantial amounts of humanitarian aid, which will include medical supplies and fuel, will also be sent by Israel into the Gaza strip. The ceasefire has been structured so that it can potentially continue after the first four days are over. Israel has said that for every additional ten hostages Hamas releases, the truce will be extended by 24 hours.

Well, it didn’t take long for Rishi Sunak’s conference to be derailed by the fate of the HS2 rail link. Today reports began to emerge that Rishi Sunak would officially announce at conference that the Birmingham to Manchester leg of the route would be scrapped – ending over a week of speculation about his plans for the route. The reports have been denied by Downing Street, with a spokesman saying that ‘No final decisions have been taken on Phase 2 of HS2’. But the news has already managed to create ructions at conference.

The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has woken up to a harsh set of front pages this morning following his Autumn Statement, with the Mail accusing the Tories of ‘soaking the strivers’ and the Telegraph lead headline quoting an economist who says the Chancellor has combined ‘the rhetoric of George Osborne and the policies of Gordon Brown’. In particular the Chancellor has come under fire for raising the tax burden to a post-war high while also overseeing what the Office for Budget Responsibility says will be the biggest fall in living standards over the same period. The Chancellor therefore set out this on the morning broadcast round to steady the ship and see off criticism from the Tory backbenches.

Just what is going on in Leicester? Last night violence broke out in the city after hundreds of young men in Covid masks and balaclavas took to the streets as part of an ‘unplanned protest’. The police attempted to contain the protestors but soon lost control of the situation. Videos posted online show officers struggling to contain the crowds while bottles fly and smash on the pavement around them. In another unverified video a group of men flip a car. According to the police, two arrests have been made and they are investigating several other incidents of violence and disorder. For the past few weeks Leicester has become a kind of mini-Kashmir in the middle of England, with clashes, protests and disorder breaking out in the city between young Muslim and Hindu men.

What did Boris Johnson know about Chris Pincher before appointing him as deputy chief whip? That question has been haunting No. 10 ever since it emerged that Pincher allegedly groped two men at the Carlton Club last week – with previous allegations about Pincher’s behaviour coming to light in recent days. So far the government line has been shaky to say the least. On Friday a government spokesperson said that the Prime Minister had been unaware of any specific allegations against Pincher before appointing him. That position shifted early this week, with the government then saying that Boris Johnson had been aware of media reports about Pincher, but they were ‘allegations that were either resolved or did not progress to a formal complaint.