Politics

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

Monday

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Is No. 10 about to move on the Brady amendment?

Is the government heading for a Commons defeat on its coronavirus powers? Judging from the speeches on the Tory benches in the chamber this afternoon, things are not looking particularly promising for Boris Johnson. Desmond Swayne used the debate to ask whether the Prime Minister has been abducted by Dr Strangelove and reprogrammed by Sage while Lucy Allan argued science is often just as much about opinion as politics.  Coffee House understands that those behind the amendment believe support is closer to 80 The critical conversations, however, have been going on out of sight. As Tory support grows for the Brady amendment — which seeks to give parliament a say on changes to

Matthew Lynn

Why is Jamie Oliver so against freedom of choice?

It will involve hundreds of hours of haggling over thousands of different products. It will have to pass torturous debates in Congress. And it will have to survive an election cycle or two. There are lots of hurdles in the way of a British trade deal with the United States. But now we have perhaps the greatest obstacle of all. Jamie Oliver doesn’t like it. Fresh from tidying up the collapse of his restaurant chain, and reminding us all how to get through lockdown by rustling up a tasty pasta bake, the chef is back with a new campaign, this time against ‘sub-standard’ American food. There is a problem, however.

Stephen Daisley Stephen Daisley

Inside the SNP’s growing civil war

Peter Murrell is the most powerful man in Scotland but almost no one has heard of him. The SNP chief executive shuns the spotlight but he is one half of Scotland’s ruling class: he is the husband of Nicola Sturgeon. The Sturgeon-Murrell reign has gone largely unchallenged in the ultra-disciplined SNP — but that is changing. The Sunday Times reports that party activists are plotting a vote of no confidence in Murrell at the next SNP conference. The move stems from one of those intricate vendettas in which Scottish politics and the Sicilian mafia specialise. Lanarkshire Labour never went away, it just rebranded with a saltire. The four families of

Cindy Yu Cindy Yu

Can the government avoid a showdown with Tory backbenchers?

16 min listen

Graham Brady’s amendment to give backbenchers a vote over new coronavirus restrictions looks set to pass through the Commons this week, provided it is selected by the Speaker. With the government determined not to give MPs a say, can they avoid a showdown with Tory backbenchers? Cindy Yu speaks to James Forsyth and Katy Balls.

Steerpike Steerpike

Parliament closes drinking loophole

The Times reports today that parliament’s bars are exempt from the 10 p.m. curfew as well as from mask-wearing on the grounds that they are formally considered ‘workplace canteens’ — providing what some see as a legal get out for MPs and Lords hoping to enjoy privileges denied to the rest of the country.  But palace authorities were quick to put a stop to any libationary loopholes. Conservative MP Dehenna Davison shared a statement from the Speaker’s Office: Let’s just hope the parliamentary estate isn’t about to see scenes similar to those spotted across the country this weekend…

Steerpike Steerpike

Steve Baker, lord of the rebels

Steve Baker is well-known for his rebellious streak, famously causing Theresa May major problems with her Brexit negotiations. It now appears Baker has found another PM that he can rail against. Speaking to Ross Kempsell this morning on Times Radio, the MP for Wycombe said: People have got a great deal of faith in Boris Johnson. But I’ll push the boat out — many of us will have seen Lord of the Rings, and there is a scene in Lord of the Rings where Theoden the king is under the spell of his advisors. And he has to be woken up from that spell. When he wakes up from that

Nick Tyrone Nick Tyrone

Laurence Fox’s party is doomed to fail

It was only a matter of time, in retrospect. There is a new political party in town. This one is called Reclaim and is the brainchild of the actor and singer Laurence Fox. I’m sure all of you know who Fox is already, but if not, here’s a refresher: earlier this year, Fox went on BBC Question Time. While on the programme he said some fairly innocuous things that for some strange reason blew up into a new battleground in the culture wars. Since then, Fox has become something of a hero to a certain segment of social media while being demonised by another. He’s now decided to start a

Alastair Stewart

Impartiality and the battle for broadcast

Two big kites were launched by the Sunday Times that could, should they fly, redraw the broadcasting landscape. ‘BBC critics set for top jobs in broadcasting’ its front-page headline announced. The Prime Minister, it suggested, has offered Lord Charles Moore the chairmanship of the BBC and Paul Dacre, the chairmanship of the media regulator Ofcom. Both are former editors of newspapers of the right and neither has much love for what the BBC has become. For some, it is simply an obscene Tory stitch-up. The former Guardian editor, Alan Rusbridger, was perhaps the most succinct: ‘No process. No joke. This is what an oligarchy looks like.’ Well, ‘Up to a point,

Sunday

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Inside the anti-lockdown rally

The anti-lockdown rally at Trafalgar Square was organised by Save Our Rights UK. This embryonic organisation is so new that its website only has a single page. And it seems inexperienced at staging large demos. The amplification on a windy day needed to be cranked up to the max but the sound was inaudible from many parts of the square. Dozens of protesters were parading hand-made placards – which is standard practice at a rally – but the slogans were unusually aphoristic and politically astute: ‘Quarantine is locking up the sick. Despotism is locking up the healthy.’ ‘Compliance with stupidity is consent to tyranny.’ ‘When dictatorship becomes law, resistance becomes

Steerpike Steerpike

Charles Moore on BBC reform

Former editor of The Spectator and Daily Telegraph Charles Moore is tipped to become chairman of the BBC. Despite being proactively encouraged to put himself forward for the job of director-general earlier this year, Moore made clear he would not be applying for the role. Firstly, he didn’t think he’d get it, writing in his Spectator notebook that he is ‘not a woman’ with ‘no plans to become one’ and ‘under the BBC’s diversity rules, uniformity of gender is required’. Secondly, the job didn’t appeal. He wrote ‘bureaucracy is the enemy of creativity. The BBC can only be a bureaucracy.’ But with Lord Moore now poised to become head of the BBC

Matthew Taylor

Sunday shows round-up: Steve Baker says liberty ‘dies like this’ over Coronavirus Act

Steve Baker – Liberty ‘dies like this’ with ‘draconian powers’ unchecked The government has come under fire from its own side this morning as it prepares to renew the Coronavirus Act six months after it was first put into effect. Graham Brady, the chair of the influential 1922 Committee of Conservative backbenchers, is spearheading an amendment to the act which would ensure that Parliament could vote on the emergency measures that ministers wish to take. Steve Baker, the former Brexit minister, gave his reasons for supporting this amendment: SB: I doubt really anyone understands what [the] law is… We’re in an environment where you really can’t know whether you’re a

Steerpike Steerpike

Starmer fails the Gogglebox test

There will be cheers in Labour HQ today as an Opinium poll has given Labour its first poll lead since Boris Johnson became Prime Minister. In some quarters this has been heralded as a party conference boost – even if the whole event was online this year. Starmer used that conference speech to claim Labour is becoming a ‘competent, credible opposition’. Yet while there are some signs the message is landing, not everyone is convinced by Sir Keir. Starmer failed the Friday night Gogglebox test – being given the thumbs down by the Channel 4 show’s cast for offering no little alternative to the government’s Covid policies, and then criticising after the storm: Reviewing Starmer’s performance

Saturday

Steerpike Steerpike

Paul Dacre and Boris Johnson: ‘the Boston strangler’ and the ‘alley cat’

Paul Dacre, the former editor of the Daily Mail, has reportedly been asked by the Prime Minister to chair the broadcasting regulator Ofcom. This is the same Paul Dacre who, when put in charge of the Press Complaints Commission, Boris Johnson compared to ‘putting the Boston Strangler in charge of the code of practice for door-to-door salesmen’. The same Paul Dacre who, when Boris Johnson was elected Tory leader, said that ‘the party of family values has chosen as leader a man of whom to say he has the morals of an alley cat would be to libel the feline species’. To Mr Steerpike, this doesn’t seem like the best

Steerpike Steerpike

The unintended Covid curfew street parties

As the government’s 10pm curfew on pubs and restaurants came into force this week, Mr. Steerpike can’t imagine that the outcome is exactly what No.10 were hoping for. Multiple videos on social media show pub dwellers being thrown onto the streets at 10pm, only to congregate together outside and pack onto public transport. Members of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) have said that they never discussed or modelled the curfew policy, in fact, a Sage member described it as ‘trivial’. Instead, the curfew appears to be the result of government thinking. Mr. Steerpike wonders why No.10 is implementing a policy that really does send us into the roaring 20s with illegal

Cindy Yu Cindy Yu

Is Rishi Sunak on the path to No. 10?

14 min listen

In her Telegraph column this week, Katy Balls writes about the Chancellor who everybody loves. But the road to No. 10 is not easy – what are the pitfalls Rishi Sunak could face in the months ahead? Cindy Yu talks to Katy and James Johnson, former pollster at No 10 and co-founder of J.L. Partners.

Patrick O’Flynn Patrick O'Flynn

Tories should be terrified of Starmer’s ruthless streak

How does a Labour leader going into an election with only around 200 MPs to his name become prime minister? Well, the conventional answer is that he doesn’t, as Neil Kinnock demonstrated in 1987. Kinnock stuck around for a second go in 1992, but still couldn’t get over the line. We can tell from Sir Keir Starmer’s utterances this week that he is not really a sticking around type of bloke. We can also tell that he has identified a path to Downing Street that, while rocky and full of potential pitfalls, might just be navigable. In his audacious conference speech on Tuesday, Starmer explicitly set himself a punishing goal

Nick Tyrone Nick Tyrone

Lib Dems are foolish to ditch their pro-EU commitment

The Liberal Democrats are putting a motion to their virtual conference this weekend to end the party’s commitment to trying to rejoin the EU. This will annoy many of their activists. It will convince some pro-Europeans that the time to rip up their membership cards is now (and, for many others, to feel smug about having always doubted the party). So what’s the upside? There isn’t one. Instead, this is another in a long line of useless moves by the party, built on trying to get people who will never like the Lib Dems to change their minds. To make matters worse, the motion is predictably wishy washy in what it sets

Friday

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Andrew Neil to chair a new British television news network

For some time now, there has been talk about a challenger television to rival Sky and the BBC. Now it’s official: GB News will launch early next year – under the chairmanship of Andrew Neil, who will be its flagship presenter. He is leaving the BBC and will join a new team of about a hundred journalists, in what is the most important television launch in Britain for a generation. GB News is raising between $55 million and $65 million  – and the lead investor is Discovery Inc, which is behind Discovery Channel and Science Channel. It’s stumping up about a quarter of the cash. It looks as the fundraising will be oversubscribed, building a pretty big warchest to

James Forsyth James Forsyth

A Brexit breakthrough could be on the cards

Earlier this month, the prospects for a Brexit deal did not look good. The talks weren’t making progress. But there is now cautious but growing optimism in Whitehall that there will be a deal, I say in the Times this morning. The British side now view the remaining problems as being more about process than substance. One source close to the negotiations tells me:  ‘There’s no doubt that the tone has improved but we really need to begin the intensive talks to resolve the final tricky issues. We’re keen to begin now, but at the moment the EU keeps blocking these talks and demanding more process. The real risk now