Politics

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

Wednesday

7 Aug 2024

Britain’s rioters have acted like Bolsheviks

British riots are not a new phenomenon. They were regular occurrences throughout history and usually the spark that lit the tinder was a sense of grievance that the authorities were refusing to deal with. In our century, governments have better technological means to stay attuned to public opinion. But the recent outbreaks of violent protest have taken government and parliament by surprise, and the rioting and looting may not have reached its peak. Far-right political militants have undoubtedly helped to instigate the troubles on our streets, and the question arises: are they employing a model of far-left activism that led to the Bolshevik seizure of power Russia in October 1917?

Chris Daw KC

Should we treat rioters like football hooligans?

Images of thugs causing mayhem on Britain’s streets has brought back painful memories of the football hooligans of the 1970s and 1980s. Back then, ‘firms’ of shaven-headed white men regularly went on the rampage, in and around railway stations, town centres and football grounds. Shops were looted, police officers and their horses were pelted with beer cans, and highly organised gangs did battle. Many of those involved did not even bother to attend the football matches. We’ve seen something similar in the days since the murder of three children at a Taylor Swift dance class in Southport last week. Groups of mostly white men, uncannily similar in their appearance, clothing and tattoos to the firm members of the

Ian O’Doherty

The trouble with Ireland’s balaclava ban

Balaclavas were once the preserve of bank robbers and members of the IRA, but this week they were worn by thugs who clashed with police. During riots across England, protestors concealed their faces as they threw projectiles and smashed up shops. Balaclavas were also worn during anti-immigration protests against a proposed asylum site in Coolock, Dublin, last month. The sight of criminals wearing face coverings is a terrifying one – and Ireland has responded with a proposal to ban balaclavas at protests. It’s a shame it took so long. Balaclavas were worn during anti-immigration protests in Dublin Ireland’s embattled justice minister, Helen McEntee, is weighing up draft legislation which ‘intends

Tuesday

6 Aug 2024

Max Jeffery

No one wants to lead these riots

Joe/Jeff Marsh wants to make it clear that he did not, like people keep saying, start the riots in Southport. He wasn’t at the riots. He doesn’t like riots. He’s a white nationalist, fine, but he’s also a busy, self-employed builder from Swansea. And Swansea is nowhere near Southport. All he did was share a picture of a poster about a protest to 2,000 people who subscribe to his channel on Telegram, an encrypted messaging app. A few people reposted the poster, shared his share elsewhere, then the protest just… became a riot. Joe’s trying to explain this on the phone, and I’m getting him up on Google Images while he

Freddy Gray

Who is Kamala’s VP pick – Tim Walz?

15 min listen

Freddy Gray sits down with political commentator and podcaster Dash Dobrofsky to discuss today’s news that Kamala Harris has picked Tim Walz to be her running mate. The Governor of Minnesota was joint favourite alongside Josh Shapiro. But who is Tim Walz? And can he stand up to JD Vance in the debates?

Steerpike

Watch: Ex-Met police chief blasts Starmer over riots

Finally. Someone who ran the Metropolitan Police that will actually speak to the media. Former Met Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson appeared on LBC today to give his thoughts on the riots that have spread across the UK. Quick to hit out at the Prime Minister himself, Stephenson was certainly pulling no punches… Quizzed about his thoughts on the widespread disorder that has led to damaged property and multiple arrests across the country – and the government’s response to it all – the ex-police chief was, in short, rather unimpressed. Suggesting that Cobra meetings are ‘called so that politicians can be seen to be doing something’, Stephenson also told listeners: I

Kate Andrews

Does Tim Walz really moderate the Kamala Harris ticket?

Since Kamala Harris moved to the top of the Democratic ticket, it’s been assumed she would use her boss Joe Biden’s tactic for selecting a running mate ahead of the US presidential election: picking someone with completely different credentials and characteristics, to fill in the gaps in the voting base. When Biden was running for the nomination in 2020, he pledged to select a black, female politician for his vice president nominee. When he selected Harris, he was also choosing a politician with a different (and far more progressive) political background to himself. She was ranked as one of the most left-wing senators in Washington – having held a long

Amber Duke

Kamala Harris picks Tim Walz as running mate

US vice president Kamala Harris has chosen Minnesota governor Tim Walz to be her running mate. Walz, a Midwestern Democrat with deep ties to labour movements, will be seen as an opportunity for Harris to hang on to some of the ‘blue wall’ states that president Joe Biden flipped from Donald Trump in the 2020 election. CV-wise, Walz is impressive: he was born in a small town in Nebraska, joined the Army National Guard, worked as a high-school social studies teacher and was elected to Congress in 2006. He won the governor’s mansion in Minnesota in 2018 and won reelection in 2022. Walz has his own history of pro-Israel policies and

Kate Andrews

Wall Street must brace itself for more shocks

The Chancellor has kicked off her investment tour under rather difficult circumstances. While Rachel Reeves spends the next three days in the United States and Canada trying to drum up investment for Britain, the world of finance remains with eyes glued to the turbulence of the stock market, having to admit to itself that it’s not sure what comes next. After experiencing its worst crash yesterday since Black Monday in 1987, Japan’s stock market has all but recovered, rising by 10 per cent today – its biggest single-day gains in history. Nearly all markets in Asia are on the up. But while the FTSE 100 looked set for a rebound,

Steerpike

Elon Musk slams Starmer over Facebook hate charge

The first person in the UK to be charged with stirring up racial hatred on Facebook during the riots is due in court next week. Jordan Parlour, a 28-year-old from Leeds, will appear at the city’s magistrates’ court today – but it appears his case has already attracted attention from across the pond, not least from Twitter owner Elon Musk… Musk slammed the news of the arrest after a video of a man being questioned by police was circulated – although it is not clear whether this is indeed Parlour himself. The Tesla CEO took to his social media platform in outrage, quote-tweeting the clip. ‘Arrested for making comments on

Oscar Edmondson

Keir Starmer slaps down Elon Musk over ‘civil war’ comment

13 min listen

The Prime Minister has clashed with billionaire owner of ‘X’ Elon Musk over comments that Musk made claiming that – in light of the violent disorder across the country – the UK is heading for civil war. How long will this spat go on? And is this the start of Starmer being tough on the tech giants? Elsewhere, Rachel Reeves has been in North America this week attempting to bang the drum for Britain as ‘a stable place to do business’ … stable all expect for some significant market turmoil. What’s the update? Oscar Edmondson speaks to Katy Balls and Kate Andrews. Produced by Oscar Edmondson.

Steerpike

Tory leadership hopefuls read Farage the riot act

As the country saw more violent riots last night, Tory leadership hopefuls have taken to the airwaves to condemn, er, Nigel Farage. The Reform UK leader posted a letter to Twitter on Monday morning on the weekend’s disorder, hitting out at ‘the impression of two-tier policing’ in the UK. Farage pointed to differences in the ‘soft’ police response to Black Lives Matter protestors in 2020 compared with how forces had handled rioters. The MP for Clacton concluded: We must have a more honest debate about these vital issues [like immigration] and give people the confidence that there are political solutions that are relevant to them. A recall of parliament would

Lucy Dunn

Scotland’s poorest students are being failed by the SNP

Scotland’s exam results day has been something of a disaster this year. An already stressful time for anxious pupils has been made worse after hundreds of students across the country received blank email templates instead of their grades – a gaffe which the Scottish Qualifications Authority is scrambling to fix – while a flailing Scottish government struggles to explain why the poverty-related attainment looks worse, and wider, than ever. The bad news for Scottish students doesn’t end there. 2024’s national exam results don’t just demonstrate that the gap has widened; today’s figures have almost all eclipsed pre-pandemic levels. The overall pass rate for National 5, Higher and Advanced Higher exam

Philip Patrick

Japan’s volatile stock market is causing panic

Japan’s Nikkei 225 index registered its biggest ever daily fall on Monday, plummeting by over 12 per cent and continuing the extraordinary collapse that began last Friday. Meanwhile, the Yen, which had been slowly eroding in value for months continued its dramatic resurrection moving from 162 to the dollar to under 140. At the time of writing, a technical rebound seems to be underway – but such volatility is alarming. After years of nothing very interesting happening to the Japanese economy, such upheavals have stunned locals and provoked urgent questions about causes and consequences. As to what has caused this, most are pointing to the Bank of Japan’s surprise interest

Hannah Tomes

Wales has a new First Minister. Her honeymoon won’t last long

Eluned Morgan has this morning been voted in as the new Welsh First Minister – the first woman ever to hold the position. The Labour member for Mid and West Wales was unopposed for the nomination within her party and won 28 votes out of a possible 60. The Conservatives’ Andrew RT Davies got 15 votes; Plaid Cymru’s Rhun ap Iorwerth 12. She confirmed Huw Irranca-Davies as her deputy, adding: ‘They used to say behind every successful man is a woman: on this occasion, there will be an impressive man behind a woman.’ Morgan is already facing trouble from other parties within the Senedd Members of the Senedd were recalled

Duncan Gardham

Riot police are often scared for their lives

To the rioters, it doesn’t matter that the suspect in the murder of three girls at a holiday dance camp in Southport came from a practicing Christian family, or that he was born in Cardiff and is a British citizen. It meant nothing that his hardworking parents had fled the aftermath of a genocide in Rwanda that led to an estimated 800,000 deaths. That the police had decided there was no political, religious, racial or ideological motive to the killings also meant nothing. There is one bright spot in the disorder. Police get the chance to identify the worst offenders and take them off the streets As soon as his name was

Steerpike

John Swinney faces yet another exam result blunder

Dear oh dear. Scotland’s secondary school results are in – and it’s not looking good for John Swinney’s SNP government. As vast numbers of nervous students are anxiously awaiting exam outcomes that could decide whether they get a university place, it transpires that hundreds of school pupils have instead received ‘blank’ emails this morning. Not like the Nats to underperform, eh? Just under 150,000 pupils in Scotland are due to receive the results of their national exams today and students had the option to receive these over text, by email and by post. But many of those who signed up for email results – which were expected to come in

Jawad Iqbal

Vigilante justice won’t stop the riots

There were ugly scenes in Birmingham last night after hundreds of men, some wearing masks, gathered in the Alum Rock and Bordesley Green areas of the city, following false reports that far-right protesters planned to march there. Rumours of a far-right gathering had been circulating all day and were the subject of discussions in a Telegram group linked to the initial violence in Southport after three girls were stabbed last week. In the event, the far-right protest failed to materialise, but West Midlands police are investigating reports of assault, criminal damage, and a man in possession of an offensive weapon. Scores of demonstrators had gathered to ‘protect property’ and ‘defend

Matthew Lynn

Why fears of US recession are justified

The bubble in artificial intelligence stocks has started to pop, two decades of easy money in Japan have finally started to come to an end, and (after hitting all-time highs) share values are being reassessed. There are plenty of plausible explanations for the sudden plunge in stock markets around the world over the last few days. And yet the big one is this: investors have started to worry that the global economy is heading into a recession, and they are surely right to do so. The markets are often volatile. Even so, the trading over the last few days has been wild, with Japan’s Nikkei dropping by 12 per cent

Lloyd Evans

Does Wes Streeting know what he’s doing?

Wes Streeting bounds onto the stage for a conversation with Matthew Stadlen (deputising for Iain Dale) at the Edinburgh festival. Labour’s new health secretary wears grey slacks, white trainers and an open-necked shirt. He hasn’t found time to put on a jacket or tie. ‘I came literally from the airport in my holiday get-up,’ he says. Stadlen opens with a softball question about Streeting’s emotional response to Labour’s victory. ‘Walking up Downing Street, it was all I could do not to burst into tears,’ says Streeting. The cosy atmosphere continues throughout their chat. ‘In your letter to GPs,’ says Stadlen, ‘there was real respect in your tone.’ ‘Do you dance?’