Politics Archives

Sunday

28 May 2023

Sunday shows round-up: Russian ambassador says Ukraine will not prevail

Russian ambassador – We haven’t ‘started yet to act very seriously’ In an extraordinary interview with Laura Kuenssberg, the Russian ambassador to the UK Andrei Kelin repeatedly deflected questions about Russian war crimes, instead suggesting Ukraine posed a threat to Russia. He said Russia had the power to massively escalate the conflict, and claimed it was a ‘big idealistic mistake to think that Ukraine may prevail’: Is the government really building 40 new hospitals? Kuenssberg questioned whether the government’s manifesto pledge to build 40 new hospitals was as extensive as they claimed it to be. Health Secretary Steve Barclay said the government was sticking with the proposals made in 2020, but

Ross Clark

The madness of Sunak capping food prices

It wasn’t long ago that supermarkets stood accused of selling food too cheaply. Their price wars and two-for-the-price-of-one deals were destroying farmers, undermining local shops and making us fat. How long ago that now seems, with the government now considering 1970s-style price controls. While the measures would apparently be voluntary, they would fix the prices of a number of basic foodstuffs – the sort which Jack Monroe keeps her eyes on. The price of price-fixing is likely to be more pictures of empty shelves, which of course will be blamed on Brexit You don’t need to have studied economics in any depth to understand the problem with price controls. In

John Keiger

How Keir Starmer could walk into the EU’s trap

Sir Keir Starmer and the Labour front bench are increasingly candid about their plans to ‘recalibrate’ Britain’s relationship with the EU within 18 months of entering Downing Street. Trade barriers with the EU would be lowered, regular EU-UK summits would be held at permanent official and ministerial level, a return to the Dublin Agreement on migration would be negotiated. They would also sign a UK-EU security pact. The Labour leader insists he is not promising to return the UK to the single market or the customs union. But the fear is that a novice, naïve and inexperienced Labour government would be putty in the hands of Euro-maximalist leaders of the calibre of

Tom Goodenough

Let’s call time on football’s absurd beer ban

When Qatar announced an alcohol ban at last year’s football World Cup, there was uproar. The decision, made public a few days before the tournament kicked off in November, was proof for critics that the event should never have been held in the country. But in English stadiums today a similar – and perhaps even more bizarre – rule relating to alcohol is enforced. Fans at Premier League, Championship, League One and League Two games are banned from drinking ‘in sight of the pitch’. They can booze to their heart’s content in stadium bars, but if they take a drink back to their seat, they risk being arrested and fined.

Saturday

27 May 2023

Stephen Daisley

Conservatives are blaming civil servants for their own failings

Conservatives are once again doing what they do best: whining. By ‘conservatives’, I don’t mean conservatives in any meaningful sense, but conservatives in perhaps the least meaningful sense: members and supporters of the Conservative Party. The latest grist for their self-pity mill is their conviction that the government is being undermined by the Civil Service. Specifically, that politically motivated civil servants are targeting right-wingers deemed too effective at advancing conservative principles or resisting progressive causes inside government. Victims of this vast left-wing conspiracy are said to include Suella Braverman. The Home Secretary this week dodged a ministerial code inquiry into her request that civil servants arrange a private rather than public speed awareness course after she

Steerpike

Does BBC Verify need to review the Beeb’s own output?

Much has been made about the BBC’s new Verify service, launched last week. According to the Corporation’s glutinous press release, the 60-strong team represents a ‘new brand to address the growing threat of disinformation and build trust with audiences by transparently showing how BBC journalists know the information they are reporting.’ But does such diligent fact-checking need to start at home? Steerpike couldn’t help noticing some rather odd editing by BBC Breakfast today in their segment on the tragic deaths of two teenagers in Cardiff. The footage aired by Sky News shows an electric bike caught on CCTV whizzing through the streets of the Welsh capital, followed 15 seconds later

Fraser Nelson

What’s wrong with lots of immigration?

18 min listen

This week’s net migration figures were lower than expected, but still far higher than the ‘tens of thousands’ first promised by David Cameron. What’s gone so wrong, and what’s the downside of using immigration to boost economic growth? Fraser Nelson speaks to Damian Green, the Conservative MP and former immigration minister, and James Kirkup, a Spectator regular who runs the Social Market Foundation.

David Cohen

Has New Zealand found the key to the UK’s housing crisis?

It may be difficult to imagine a housing crisis more dismal than the one Britain is experiencing right now, but New Zealand’s has come pretty close. One survey of the world’s most advanced economies showed that NZ was the ‘most vulnerable’ in the world for the less well-heeled to buy homes. Despite this, however, the Antipodeans could yet emerge in better long-term shape. At the very least, housing ought not to be a point of serious difference between New Zealand’s Labour party government and its National party-led opposition when the country has an election this October. Both major parties have until this late point in the parliamentary term put aside their usual

Julia Lewis

American bully XL dogs should be banned

The American bully XL is, despite its name and reputation, said to be good with children and a friendly dog. However, it can turn, with terrible consequences. A father of two young children was killed by a dog, believed to be an XL bully, in Leigh, Greater Manchester, last week. Jonathan Hogg, 37, had apparently been playing with the dog when it suddenly went for his throat. Hogg didn’t stand a chance against such a powerful creature. Since 2021, XL bullies – and one XL cross – have killed seven people in the UK, three of them children: Bella Rae Birch, 17 months, Alice Stones, four, and ten-year-old Jack Lis. The

Niru Ratnam

Niru Ratnam, Gus Carter and Graeme Thomson

20 min listen

This week: Niru Ratnam argues that teachers are putting principles before children (00:59), Gus Carter discusses the curious business of fertility (08:14), and Graeme Thomson reviews Beyonce at Murrayfield Stadium (14:24). Produced and presented by Oscar Edmondson.

Lisa Haseldine

Record numbers of Russian soldiers are going Awol

Few Russians go willingly to fight in the ‘meat grinder’ of Ukraine, where Russia has faced as many as 100,000 casualties. With a lack of volunteers, the Wagner Mercenary Group – which has recruited from penal colonies to keep fighting numbers up – has come to Putin’s aid. The Kremlin has also rolled out a partial mobilisation of the Russian army. Officially, 300,000 men were called up, although the true figure is likely to be higher. Many more Russians – up to a million – chose instead to flee. New analysis of cases listed in Russian military courts has revealed that record numbers of soldiers have been going absent without leave (Awol) this year. Data collected by the independent Russian investigative outlet Mediazona shows

Andrew Liddle

The by-election that could shape Scotland’s political landscape

By-election wins rarely presage great victories at a general election. If they did, the Liberal Democrats would enjoy perpetual government. But the fact they are not a forecast for national contests does not mean by-elections are always insignificant. In fact, they provide a good reflection of public mood at a given time and, particularly, sentiment towards the governing party. This has been true throughout recent history and remains true today – despite the excitement that will be generated by a Scottish Labour victory over the SNP at the coming by-election in Rutherglen and Hamilton West. The current MP, Margaret Ferrier, faces being removed by her constituents. She has been sentenced to 270 hours community

Friday

26 May 2023

Steerpike

Phillip Schofield resigns and admits affair with ‘younger male’

And so the extraordinary Phillip Schofield row rumbles on. Earlier this week it was announced that Schofield was steeping down from the TV show This Morning, amid reports that his relationship with his co-host Holly Willoughby had collapsed. Now Schofield has admitted that he had an affair with a ‘younger male colleague’ and has resigned from ITV with immediate effect. After his departure from This Morning, Schofield was still scheduled to host the British Soap Awards next weekend. He has now confirmed that he will no longer take part in the event. Schofield has also been dropped by his agent of 35 years. ‘I am so very, very sorry, as I am for having been

Patrick O’Flynn

The misdirected talent of Mizzy, the ‘TikTok terror’

Tessa Jowell once ignited a furious political row by claiming that inner-city youths active in criminal gangs were exhibiting a misdirected spirit of enterprise. ‘These people have very formidable entrepreneurial skills which they have put to bad use,’ she claimed. I was put in mind of her observation when watching the teenage TikTok miscreant Mizzy being grilled by Piers Morgan on television this week. For the benefit of the vanishingly small number of people still unaware of the exploits of Mizzy, real name Bacari-Bronze O’Garro, this youth has become notorious for videoing himself carrying out extremely unpleasant and traumatising ‘pranks’ on unsuspecting members of the public. These have included taking

Kate Andrews

Hunt’s honesty on a recession to tackle inflation is refreshing

The government has been claiming since the start of the year that it’s on a mission to ‘halve inflation’ – despite having virtually no control in this area. Still, this week Rishi Sunak ramped up the narrative when the latest set of data showed the headline rate falling from 10.1 per cent on the year in March to 8.7 per cent in April. It was false optimism. And it’s backfired. Markets quickly saw past the headline rate and looked at all the worrying news underlying it: mainly that core inflation actually rose, nearing 7 per cent on the year in April. Borrowing costs have spiked since then: 10-year gilt yields hit 4.37 per cent

Kate Andrews

Why are borrowing costs surging?

13 min listen

James Heale speaks to Fraser Nelson and Kate Andrews about the news that borrowing costs are back to being the highest since last Autumn. What could this mean for the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt?

Gavin Mortimer

Does a ‘Pride progress’ flag really make rugby more inclusive?

The Rugby Football Union will fly the ‘Pride Progress’ flag at Twickenham this weekend, when a World XV team play the Barbarians invitational side. According to the Daily Telegraph, the RFU’s decision is ‘in response to the selection of Israel Folau’ in the World XV. The 34-year-old Folau was a regular in the Australian team for a number of years before he was sacked in 2019 for airing his views on homosexuality. A devout Christian, Folau has subsequently represented Tonga, from where his family – and faith – originates. Why do some bourgeois progressives appear incapable of respecting the beliefs of Christians and Muslims? It is 200 years since missionaries from

Steerpike

Penny Mordaunt to woo the Thatcherites

Throw a right-wing political shindig these days and you’re guaranteed to make a splash. Last week it was Suella Braverman at the National Conservatism conference; before that it was Priti Patel at the ‘Borisfest’ in Bournemouth. And now Mr S has two more dates pencilled in his diary for potential mischief-making: the Northern Research Group (NRG) conference in Doncaster on 9 June and the Margaret Thatcher conference at the Guildhall three days later. And it’s the line-up of the latter convention which has caught Steerpike’s eye. Gillian Keegan, the Education Secretary and dark horse leadership candidate, is due to give the opening address – an opportunity to burnish her credentials

Anna Arutunyan

Is Yevgeny Prigozhin having second thoughts about the Ukraine war?

Something strange is happening to Yevgeny Prigozhin. The chief of Vladimir Putin’s mercenary army in Ukraine has begun withdrawing his forces from Bakhmut, has all but conceded defeat in one of his most bizarre interviews yet, and, to top it off, now the journalist who interviewed him has been fired. ‘We came in boorishly, trampling all over Ukraine’s territory in search of Nazis. And while we searched for Nazis, we fucked up everyone we could,’ Prigozhin told the pro-war political journalist Konstantin Dolgov in an interview on Tuesday. ‘The special military operation was done for the purpose of ‘denazification’…But we ended up legitimising Ukraine. We’ve made Ukraine into a nation

Thursday

25 May 2023

Iain Macwhirter

Is Police Scotland ‘institutionally racist’?

‘Dear transphobes, we have a phobia of your behaviour…Yours, Scotland’. That was just one of Police Scotland’s ‘Letters from Scotland’ campaign posters that started appearing across Scotland five years ago. Misogynists, racists and religious bigots were warned by the chief constable Sir Iain Livingstone, who fronted the campaign, that they’d be dealt with the full force of the law. So it is more than a little ironic that, according to Sir Iain himself, the haters have been hiding in plain sight in the ranks of his own force. ‘Police Scotland is institutionally racist and discriminatory,’ Sir Iain announced today to the Scottish Police Authority. It is also institutionally sexist and