Katy Balls is The Spectator’s political editor.
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Social care has always been a difficult issue for incumbent governments in recent years. The coronavirus pandemic brings this to the fore. As ONS figures show that more than 5,000 deaths have happened in UK care homes in April, Cindy, James, and Katy discuss what this means for future social care policy on the podcast.
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The Prime Minister has kicked off his return to Downing Street with a speech to the nation, setting out the next steps in the battle against coronavirus.
The Prime Minister is back at his desk in No. 10 today and kicked off his first full working day since his coronavirus hospitalisation with a statement to the nation. Addressing cameras outside 10 Downing Street, the Prime Minister paid tribute to First Secretary of State Dominic Raab for leading the government in his absence and the
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With James Turner, CEO of the Sutton Trust, and Fraser Nelson. Presented by Katy Balls.
Although the coronavirus pandemic means that we are living in uncertain times, some things remain predictable. As is the case with the current Brexit talks where Michel Barnier has bemoaned a lack of progress. As round two of the UK-EU negotiations comes to a close, the EU’s chief negotiator has voiced his disappointment – while
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The Telegraph reports this morning that Boris Johnson is planning to be back at work by Monday next week. He couldn’t come back sooner – with the Prime Minister laid up, the Cabinet has split over the question of easing the lockdown (as James Forsyth writes this week). So can Boris unite his team behind
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Ruby Wax is an actress, comedian, and mental health campaigner, for which she received an OBE. On the podcast, she tells Katy about her difficult upbringing which put Carrie Fisher’s to shame, the moment she realised she couldn’t act, and her campaigning work, especially during these stressful times.
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The Scottish government’s document ‘Looking Beyond Lockdown’ tries to do what it says on the tin. But it comes at an inconvenient time for the government in Downing Street, just as it is facing accusations that it hasn’t been clear enough with the public about what is needed to end the lockdown. On the podcast,
One issue the government is reluctant to discuss publicly is an exit strategy out of the lockdown. Inside 10 Downing Street, there’s a sense that it’s become a media obsession when the day-to-day focus ought to be encouraging the public to practise social distancing. During Wednesday’s press conference, chief medical officer Chris Whitty did discuss
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It’s Keir Starmer’s first Prime Minister’s Questions as Leader of the Opposition, but it also happened to be the first virtual session, where MPs dialled down the line via Zoom. So how did it go?
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Is Matt Hancock the government’s ‘fall guy’? As Katy Balls details on Coffee House, the Health Secretary’s 100,000 target has rubbed up some in government in the wrong way, with the Daily Telegraph’s front page today reporting that an insider close to No 10 has dubbed it ‘irrational’ and ‘arbitrary’. So what’s going on behind
Is Matt Hancock being lined up as the ‘fall guy‘ over coronavirus? That’s the suggestion being made today following a number of stories questioning the Health Secretary’s performance. The most striking of which is the Telegraph splash on a Downing Street source describing Hancock’s 100,000 test target as ‘irrational’, ‘arbitrary’ and a mistaken response to media
‘Will the public be asked to wear face masks in public?’ This is a topic of debate today for the government’s SAGE committee of scientific advisers. Although the government dismissed the idea early on in the coronavirus pandemic, many other countries have since changed their own advice in support of them (read Dr John Lee’s analysis
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Over 140,000 businesses have applied for the government’s employee furlough scheme on its first day of launch. This is a far higher uptake than those in government expected, Kate Andrews says on the podcast, so for how long can the government afford to keep it going?
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Behind the scenes, the Cabinet is split on whether or not to lift the lockdown. The hawks such as Rishi Sunak, Liz Truss, and Alok Sharma, are concerned about the economic and human costs of a sustained lockdown; the doves, such as Matt Hancock, worry that lifting the lockdown too soon risks a second wave.
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The government revealed today that its testing capacity is at 38,000 a day. So why, then, are less than 16,000 tests being taken each day so far? Cindy, James, and Katy also discuss the new vaccines task force, the extension of the furlough scheme, and what the latest numbers out of China mean.
In the weeks leading up to Boris Johnson announcing lockdown measures, ministers and aides wondered how in the world you could enforce a lockdown like the one seen in authoritarian China in a liberal democracy such as the UK. But following Dominic Raab confirmation on Thursday that there will be another three weeks of lockdown, public
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As expected, Dominic Raab announced an extension to the lockdown today, with no clear end date set. But he did offer insight into the criteria that the government is using to judge when that time might come. Katy Balls writes about it here and she discusses them on the latest episode with James and Cindy. The
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Historian Niall Ferguson writes in this week’s cover piece that, even before coronavirus, the Cold War between America and China was already getting underway. With the current pandemic, animosity between the two superpowers has only increased. So when it comes to the geopolitics of the ‘corona wars’, who will win? Niall tells Cindy on the podcast
Dominic Raab has this evening confirmed that there will a lockdown extension of three weeks. The First Secretary of State said that while there had been encouraging signs that the rate of infection had significantly reduced, it was still too early to break away from any lockdown measures. He said the most dangerous thing for both