Politics

Read about the latest UK political news, views and analysis.

Friday

Eliot Wilson

Trump should be allowed to address Parliament

Labour MPs have been busy this week. No, not running the country – but voicing their opposition to Donald Trump’s state visit. Diane Abbott, Nadia Whittome and Clive Lewis are among 17 parliamentarians campaigning to ensure the US President isn’t allowed to address the Houses of Parliament. Their Early Day Motion rehearses various criticisms of the President – ‘misogynism, racism and xenophobia’ and his treatment of Ukraine – and says it would be ‘inappropriate’ for Trump to be given the honour when he comes to the UK in September. Like him or loathe him, MPs must treat Trump with respec This legislative stunt is unlikely to trouble Trump. The Early Day Motion

Owen Matthews

Owen Matthews, Matthew Parris, Marcus Nevitt, Angus Colwell and Sean Thomas

31 min listen

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Owen Matthews reads his letter from Rome (1:21); Matthew Parris travels the Channel Islands (7:53); Reviewing Minoo Dinshaw, Marcus Nevitt looks at Bulstrode Whitelocke and Edward Hyde, once close colleagues who fell out during the English civil war (15:19); Angus Colwell discusses his Marco Pierre White obsession, aided by the chef himself (21:26); and, Sean Thomas provides his notes on boredom (26:28).  Produced and presented by Patrick Gibbons.

Thursday

Steerpike Steerpike

Pirates beseige maritime minister over ferries farrago

It’s not just the SNP who can’t sort out their ferries. A new row has broken out much further south over the failure to provide affordable transport to the 140,000 residents on the Isle of Wight. The local Tory MP Joe Robertson is leading the charge over rocketing ferry prices, which mean a return trip to the mainland will now cost locals a whopping £486. Such is the level of local discontent that residents are taking matters into their own hands. A meeting of MPs and ferry bosses yesterday in Cowes was convened to discuss the state of cross-Solent ferries. Unfortunately for Mike Kane, the Maritime Minister, the event was

Owen Matthews

‘Vladimir, STOP!’ – Trump is being humiliated by Putin

Theodore Roosevelt was a believer in speaking softly but carrying a big stick. But where does that leave Donald Trump, who today resorted to all-caps plea, or perhaps demand, that Putin ‘STOP!’ his offensive operations against Ukrainian cities – yet backed up his entreaty with precisely nothing?  ‘I am not happy with the Russian strikes on KYIV.’ Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social after footage emerged of civilians buried under rubble in Kyiv, Kharkiv and Odessa. ‘Not necessary, and very bad timing. Vladimir, STOP!’  The message was a rare instance of Trump directly criticising Putin. Indeed, just a few hours before the latest Russian strikes on Ukraine’s capital, Trump

Damian Thompson Damian Thompson

See change, A.I. ghouls & long live the long lunch!

38 min listen

This week: the many crises awaiting the next pope ‘Francis was a charismatic pope loved by most of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics’ writes Damian Thompson in the cover article this week. But few of them ‘grasp the scale of the crisis in the Church… The next Vicar of Christ, liberal or conservative’ faces ‘challenges that dwarf those that confronted any incoming pope in living memory’.   Ahead of Pope Francis’s funeral this weekend, Damian joined the podcast alongside the Catholic theologian Fr Alexander Lucie-Smith to unpack all the political intrigue underpinning the upcoming papal conclave. They say that he who enters the conclave as a pope, leaves as a cardinal

Freddie Attenborough

The danger of banning face coverings at protests

As the government’s Crime and Policing Bill makes its way through parliament, MPs on the Public Bill Committee are scrutinising its clauses today – including, potentially, Clause 86. If passed, this provision will make it a criminal offence to conceal your identity at a protest. For some people this may sound sensible enough. But for dissidents from authoritarian regimes – and their families thousands of miles away – it’s a very real threat to their physical safety. In fairness to those currently grappling with the issue, the legislation responds to a genuine problem: the adoption in the UK of the ‘black bloc’ face-concealing tactics pioneered by radical anarchists in the US.

Leon Mangasarian

The AfD is surging in the polls

Friedrich Merz, the victor of German elections in February is struggling even before he takes office. Outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats (SPD) – the election losers – used coalition talks to ram through their policies in a 144-page pact to serve as junior partner to Merz’s Christian Democrats. The accord shies away from any big reforms of the economy, of the creaking social welfare state and even from the no-brainer of reinstating military conscription to help deter Russia. The agreement is so bad and so dilutes the Economics Ministry’s powers that Merz’s own Christian Democratic (CDU) secretary general, Carsten Linnemann, abruptly declared he no longer wants to take over the portfolio. Linnemann will stay on in his post as the party’s Mann fürs Grobe, or hatchet man.With Germany probably now in a third year of recession, a weak economics minister will be Berlin’s whipping boy.  Conservative voters are drawing conclusions and flocking to the AfD, which came second to Merz’s Christian Democratic bloc

Jenny Lindsay

Scotland’s school toilet ruling is another win for women’s rights

In the Scottish Borders, Earlston Primary School’s newly built campus has no single-sex toilet provision. This astonishing planning decision was reportedly made after undertaking training by LGBT Youth Scotland. It was also based on the Scottish government’s similar guidance, which one can easily assume may well be based on the same advice, so eager have the SNP been to outsource their thinking on policy in this area to activist lobby groups they generously fund to then lobby them. Yesterday, this illegality was brought to a halt, aided in no small part by the victory of For Women Scotland in the Supreme Court last Wednesday, which reconfirmed that the legal situation all

Steerpike Steerpike

Starmer’s trade deal vote hypocrisy

Well, well, well. While Rachel Reeves enjoys a week in Washington DC at the International Monetary Fund spring talks, back in the UK concerns are mounting about what concessions Britain will have to make to enter into a trade deal with Donald Trump’s America. Fears are growing about what Trump’s current tariffs will means for the future of Britain’s car industry while farmers have raised concerns about chlorinated chicken and food standards. So, on Wednesday, Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey quizzed Sir Keir Starmer about whether he would commit to a parliamentary vote on whatever economic deal gets arranged with the US. The Prime Minister, however, remained curiously non-committal…

James Heale James Heale

Farage plans ‘Minister for deportations’

Machinery of government is not the sexiest of subjects – but it is a useful way of signalling a politician’s priorities. Rishi Sunak used his first reshuffle to rebrand the ‘Department for Energy Security’ and create a new ministry for science. Boris Johnson invented the Department for Levelling Up; Jeremy Corbyn proposed a ‘Minister for Peace.’ Now, Nigel Farage has floated his own changes to the Whitehall machine, with the creation of a new ministry for deportations. At a Dover press conference this morning, the Reform leader declared that: We will demand a minister for deportations. It will be part of the Home Office but it will be a separate

Michael Simmons Michael Simmons

Can Rachel Reeves woo Trump’s team – without alienating the EU?

The government is on a charm offensive in Washington. Tonight, Britain’s ambassador to the US, Lord Mandelson, will host officials from Donald Trump’s government and American business figures at the British embassy. Tomorrow, the Chancellor will meet her counterpart, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Rachel Reeves is looking to permanently end the punishing 25 per cent tariff on British cars and 10 per levy on other exports. Reeves has given an interview to one of Trump’s favourite channels, Newsmax, in which she was asked about her upcoming meeting with Bessent. In response, Reeves said she believed ‘there was a deal to be done’ and that both Keir Starmer’s and Trump’s governments

James Snell

I’ve had enough of crimewave Britain

Knife crime, shoplifting and fraud is on the rise in Britain. Fraud was up by a third in the last year, according to figures released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which also reveal a 50 per cent increase (to around 483,000 incidents) in theft. Shoplifting offences rose by 20 per cent in 2024 – reaching the highest figure in over 20 years. What’s shocking about this tidal wave of crime is that it is hardly surprising. Anyone who has lived in England over the last decade or so cannot fail to have noticed that our streets feel more dangerous. Where I live in Essex, there have been more stabbings. Many people

Ross Clark Ross Clark

Fact check: is Ed Miliband right to say tax rises don’t affect gas prices?

It’s official: subjecting oil and gas companies to a 78 pence tax rate (which is corporation tax plus the government’s windfall tax) doesn’t increase energy prices in the UK. That is what Ed Miliband told us on Sky News this morning, so it must be true. He will no doubt be hoping that we don’t look at the figures published by his own department which show that gas consumers in Britain pay an average of 10.17 pence per kilowatt-hour while US consumers – where the oil and gas industry is encouraged rather than taxed to near-extinction – pay the equivalent of 4.04 pence. Sky's @WilfredFrost questions the Energy Secretary Ed

Michael Simmons Michael Simmons

Who do voters trust most on the economy?

12 min listen

Chancellor Rachel Reeves has been in Washington D.C. this week at the IMF’s spring meetings, and will meet US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent tomorrow. Cue the ususal talk of compromising on chlorinated chicken. Not so, reports the Spectator’s economics editor Michael Simmons, who explains that Reeves may offer a reduction in long-standing tariffs already imposed on American cars. But, it’s been a bad week of economic news for the Chancellor as the IMF downgraded the UK’s growth forecast.  We’re also one week away from the local elections – Starmer’s first big test since last year’s general election. The economy isn’t usually the number one issue at local elections but, as More in

Matthew Lynn

Can Rachel Reeves get a US trade deal over the line?

As the Chancellor Rachel Reeves flies into Washington for a series of high-level meetings, there is lots of spin from the Treasury that she is about to tie up a trade deal with the United States. The plan is that it would save the UK from tariffs and may even give a much needed boost to the British economy. But all the evidence we have tells us that Reeves is a terrible negotiator who constantly overestimates her own abilities. It is far more likely she will blow the deal at the last minute.  It hardly sounds like a very promising meeting. On Friday, Reeves is due to meet with President

Catriona Stewart

Swinney’s ‘anti-Reform’ summit didn’t achieve much

John Swinney’s cross-party civic gathering – or ‘anti-Reform summit’ – met in Glasgow on Wednesday, with political party leaders from across Holyrood prepared to discuss how to rid Scotland of the hard right. Yet what began as a ‘Democratic Resilience Summit’ rather backfired for those politicians keen to push back against Reform UK’s surge in Scotland – as it turned into a chance for Nigel Farage’s party to enjoy free publicity. Some 50 organisations from across civic society – including religious and third sector groups as well as every Holyrood party leader except Russell Findlay of the Tories – met in the centre of Glasgow to agonise over how to

Mark Galeotti Mark Galeotti

What the exploding DHL packages tell us about the Kremlin

The unfolding tale of incendiary devices planted in DHL packages across Europe not only highlights the dangers of Moscow’s campaign of direct measures against the West. It also suggests that, contrary to more alarmist claims, it is possible for such threats to be deterred and limited. In July of last year, a package bound for Britain ignited in the section of Leipzig airport devoted to DHL cargo freight. Another caught fire later that month in a DHL depot in Birmingham. Two more were found in Poland, one of which set light to a warehouse in Warsaw, while the other was successfully intercepted. After the US government’s quiet intervention, Moscow did

Steerpike Steerpike

Siddiq hits back at Bangladesh over arrest warrant

Back to the curious case of Tulip Siddiq, Labour’s former anti-corruption minister who has been issued with an arrest warrant by Bangladesh over, um, corruption. Earlier this month, the Hampstead and Highgate MP was slapped with the warrant after the country’s Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) submitted a criminal charge sheet against the politician over investigations involving her aunt, and Bangladesh’s recently deposed prime minister, Sheikh Hasina. Now Siddiq’s lawyers have pushed back, accusing the country’s authorities of failing to uphold the MP’s ‘fundamental right to justice’. And so it rumbles on… Siddiq’s legal representatives blasted Bangladesh’s ACC for having ‘failed to provide a single piece of documentary evidence’ against her after

Ross Clark Ross Clark

No, Ed Miliband: zonal pricing won’t cut energy bills

Is Ed Miliband going to announce a move towards a zonal electricity market, where wholesale prices would vary between regions of Britain? It would appear to be on cards following the Energy and Climate Secretary’s interview on the Today programme in which he said he was considering the idea. Miliband’s apparent support for the plan follows intense lobbying by Greg Jackson, CEO of Octopus Energy as well as support from the National Energy System Operator (NESO), the new government-owned company which oversees the grid. However, zonal pricing is bitterly opposed by others in the energy industry, including Chris O’Shea, the generously-moustached CEO of Centrica, and Dale Vince, CEO of Electrocity

Stephen Daisley Stephen Daisley

Keir Starmer is a shallow man

Keir Starmer thinks ‘this is the time now to lower the temperature’ on the gender debate. To ‘move forward’. To ‘conduct this debate with the care and compassion that it deserves’. That is what he said at Prime Minister’s Questions. What a shallow, hollow man he is. Now is the time to lower the temperature? Not when women’s meetings were being cancelled, their proceedings disrupted, and their attendees attacked? Not when Kathleen Stock was being hounded out of Sussex University, Maya Forstater lost her employment contract, or Jo Phoenix was unfairly constructively dismissed from the Open University? Not when David Lammy called gender critics ‘dinosaurs’, Angela Rayner signed a charter