Politics

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

Thursday

Dot Wordsworth

What’s the word for a word that’s been used only once?

It is easy to speak a sentence never spoken before since the world came fresh from its mould. It’s not so easy to say a word unsaid by any other lips. In its second edition (1989) the Oxford English Dictionary recorded numbskullism with a single illustrative quotation, from Anne Seward, a younger contemporary of Samuel Johnson’s from Lichfield, who wrote of the numbskullism of George I and George II. In a revision of 2000, the OED adds a citation from a video game newsletter. Any old body could use it now. There remains numskullity, unattested since Jeremy Bentham used it in 1779 — until now, that is. Since English employs

Charles Day

Lady Hale must recuse herself from Boris Johnson’s cases

Brenda Hale is an incredibly clever and more importantly, kind, human being. On a human level you would do well to make a beeline for her at any party or stuffy function. Few judges have done more to help charitable causes and access to law. As I’m not a politician, you can trust me when I praise someone. It does though feel odd to do so. Lawyers never used to. Being nice or kind or even human; well that wasn’t really our thing. To be honest we have always been extremely vicious to each other – in private. I have a second favourite judge of all time when it comes

Ian Acheson Ian Acheson

The dangerous myth of the ‘bad border’ in Northern Ireland 

The Irish border is awash with journalists and pundits from Great Britain, scratching their heads in wet frontier fields patrolled by incurious Friesians. No border bridge has been left unmolested by visiting television crews in search of a sombre framing shot. The former ‘Killing Fields’ outside Enniskillen were my home until I left for university in England at 18. I don’t decry the honest attempts of blow-in journalists to explain the conundrum of what Churchill wearily dismissed as the ‘dull and dreary steeples of Fermanagh and Tyrone’ – it’s a bit of a head melter all right. But the blaring singularity of the ‘bad border’ narrative we hear far too

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The Brexit blame game

There will be no last-minute deal. The talks between the UK and the EU have effectively broken down. It isn’t that there’s no light at the end of the tunnel, it’s that there’s no tunnel at all. The blame game is now far more advanced than the negotiations. The diplomatic crockery has been smashed even before Boris Johnson and the leaders of the EU27 have arrived in Brussels for this month’s European Council. The question now is whether the talks can ever be resuscitated at a later date —  or if we are in a world where the only options are no Brexit or no deal. The assumption had long been

Robert Peston Robert Peston

Has Leo Varadkar come to Boris Johnson’s rescue?

I pass on, with little confidence or real understanding, that Boris Johnson seems to believe that Leo Varadkar and Dublin have lessened their objections of principle to his Brexit offer. Maybe both sides are moving in a significant way. We’ll see. What I should point out however is that if the negotiations were to collapse this weekend, that would be the worst timing for Johnson, because it would spur rebel Tory MPs to use SO24 next week to take control of Commons business – and they would try to get a motion passed in favour of a referendum on May’s gone-but-not-forgotten Brexit deal. When that flopped (as it probably would), the rebels would go for a

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Johnson and Varadkar: It’s not over yet

Is all hope lost that a Brexit deal can be agreed before 31 October? That’s been the mood music coming from both the UK and Brussels in recent days. However, Boris Johnson and Leo Varadkar have this afternoon made a joint statement making clear that they haven’t given up on agreeing a deal just yet. After holding two hours of talks in a Cheshire countryside bolthole, Johnson and Varadkar released a joint statement in which they said that they could both ‘see a pathway to a possible deal’: ‘The Prime Minister and Taoiseach have had a detailed and constructive discussion. Both continue to believe that a deal is in everybody’s

Liam Halligan

Germany’s ailing economy can’t afford a no-deal Brexit

The UK was the ‘sick man’ when we ‘joined Europe’ in 1973. Now, with Britain on the cusp of leaving, the European Union’s largest economy is decidedly out of sorts. After failing to recover over the summer, Germany is now almost certainly in recession. The state of the fourth biggest economy on earth always matters — but with Germany dragging down the broader eurozone, its declining health could decisively impact Brexit negotiations too. Politically, Brussels and Dublin are bullish. They have dismissed Boris Johnson’s proposals, gambling on an extension and perhaps Brexit being cancelled entirely. But such intransigence could yet cause a disorderly no-deal Brexit — which would have a

Martin Vander Weyer Martin Vander Weyer

Are Boris’s hedge-fund pals conspiring to ‘short the UK’? I doubt it

Minding my own business at 67 Pall Mall — the private members’ club favoured by oenophile West End hedge-fund managers that will serve as this week’s restaurant tip — I’m watching two tieless but well-tailored gents at the next table sampling different vintages of Château Pichon Longueville. And I’m thinking: ‘Bastards! These must be the friends-of-Boris who are conspiring to reap billions from a no-deal Brexit!’ It was former chancellor Philip Hammond who wrote recently of Johnson being ‘backed by speculators’, citing the PM’s sister Rachel who had spoken of the influence on him of ‘people who have invested billions in shorting the pound and shorting the country’. The novelist

Jo Johnson

David Cameron’s For the Record ends where the sorriest three years in modern British history begin

It’s fun to look for what’s missing in a memoir; the forgotten egos, the policy howlers buried for posterity. Some omissions are accidental. When Tony Blair published his autobiography in 2010, he raised eyebrows by neglecting to mention his celebrated blue-skies thinker, John Birt. Over more than 700 pages, For the Record is punctilious and dutiful in name-checking the many fallen Cameroonian foot-soldiers who sacrificed themselves in the cause of Conservative modernisation. It is a testament to David Cameron’s great qualities — his quick wit, habitual cheeriness and calmness under pressure — just how many of them there are. No one working in No. 10 expected to become close pals

Wednesday

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Tories fret over further election delay

Members of the One Nation caucus of Conservative MPs met with Boris Johnson this afternoon over concerns the party could shift to a no-deal platform if an election takes place after a Brexit delay. No. 10 sources have suggested such a policy could be the best electoral route for the Tories in this scenario – as they would need something to prevent frustrated Leave voters moving to the Brexit party. However, attendees at the meeting say they left reassured this was not the case – with Johnson suggesting that a policy of only accepting no deal was unlikely to make its way into the Tory manifesto. But as these MPs worry

Steerpike Steerpike

Revealed: David Cameron’s ‘Gove protocol’

When Michael Gove was welcomed back into government this year and appointed Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, some wondered if Boris Johnson was really wise to trust his old nemesis with the serious business of government. After all, Gove both ran against the PM in the recent leadership contest and, infamously, stabbed him in the back after the Brexit vote in 2016. But if Boris is looking for inspiration about how to handle his colleague, it appears that there are other prime ministers who might be able to help. David Cameron for one apparently distrusted Gove so much he developed his own protocol for managing his Chief Whip. In

Tuesday

Robert Peston Robert Peston

Is the EU about to offer a time-limited backstop?

This morning when Angela Merkel told Boris Johnson his Brexit offer did not provide the requisite confidence that the border on the island of Ireland would be kept open while preserving the integrity of the EU’s single market, it looked as though any Brexit deal was dead – and that the Prime Minister would therefore now focus all his efforts on achieving a no-deal Brexit, while MPs would focus all theirs on forcing him to ask for a Brexit delay. Tonight the president of the European Parliament, David Maria Sassoli, met Johnson and reinforced Merkel’s message that the British offer falls well short. So a Brexit deal is all over

Steerpike Steerpike

Jess Phillips’ supersonic door-knocking

Elections are a busy period for most politicians – the time when they hit the streets of their constituencies, knock on doors and hand out thousands of leaflets – all in an attempt to keep their seats in the House of Commons. And while some undoubtably do work hard for every ballot slip, some MPs are inclined to exaggerate their own heroic efforts when it comes to winning a tightly-fought vote. It appeared that the Labour MP Jess Phillips may have fallen into that trap this afternoon, when she appeared on the BBC’s Politics Live. When discussing the 2017 general election and how important Brexit was to her constituents, the

Katy Balls Katy Balls

The voters who will prove pivotal at the next election

As the prospect of a Brexit deal drifts further away and a blame game ensues between Downing Street and Brussels, the UK is on course for a volatile general election. As James reveals on Coffee House, No. 10’s attention has moved to how to position the Conservatives in an election in during a Brexit extension. A senior Downing Street source tells him: ‘Those who pushed the Benn Act intended to sabotage a deal and they’ve probably succeeded. So the main effect of it will probably be to help us win an election by uniting the leave vote and then a no deal Brexit. History is full of such ironies and tragedies.’

Brendan O’Neill Brendan O’Neill

Extinction Rebellion is a menace

It’s tempting to laugh at Extinction Rebellion. I do it myself frequently. Those yoga sessions on Westminster Bridge. The amateur dramatics of wandering around in naff crimson-red outfits to symbolise ‘the common blood we share with all species’. That lame rave-style dancing they do as some bloke in an overlong beard plays the drums while his parents in the Home Counties wonder when he’s going to come to his senses and join his dad’s law firm. It’s all so ridiculous. They fancy themselves as revolutionaries but really this is just Hampstead and Homerton, the posh and the hip, descending on Westminster for a few days to wail about how howwible

Robert Peston Robert Peston

Angela Merkel rejects Boris Johnson’s Brexit offer

This feels very big: Boris Johnson spoke with German Chancellor Angela Merkel at 8am this morning, and according to a Downing Street source, she told the prime minister that there will be no Brexit deal with the UK unless Northern Ireland is in the customs union “forever”. The source says she repeated “forever” on “multiple occasions”. So what she is saying is there can be no time-limited backstop. And of course it is a wholesale rejection of Johnson’s offer to replace the backstop. “France is saying the same thing”, according to the source. The government’s conclusion is that EU leaders have decided to make an example of the UK –

Stephen Daisley Stephen Daisley

Thwarting Brexit probably won’t stop Brexit

What if they succeed in thwarting Brexit? The odds seem weighted against Boris Johnson delivering his do-or-die (-in-a-ditch) promise to get the UK out of the EU by Halloween. The Benn Act has tied the government’s hands so there is no need for Brussels to budge. Donald Tusk can wait until Johnson cracks and complies, or until the Remain Parliament ousts him and installs a prime minister who will hold a second referendum or revoke Article 50 altogether.  Because MPs have no commonly agreed position, we can’t be sure which eventuality we’re heading for, but we can agree that Britain’s membership continuing on November 1 would represent a big defeat

Monday

Steerpike Steerpike

Boris Johnson takes on Extinction Rebellion at book launch

To the launch of the final volume of Charles Moore’s biography of Margaret Thatcher at Banqueting House. A mix of cabinet ministers, government aides and hacks descended on the Policy Exchange bash to hear both Moore and Boris Johnson speak. With the climate change Extinction Rebellion protests shutting down Whitehall, a number of ministers arrived via an underground tunnel to minimise disruption. Taking to the stage to pay credit to his former boss Charles Moore for his work on the biography, the Prime Minister said that he had been advised against attending by his own team: ‘I am afraid that the security people didn’t want me to come along tonight

James Forsyth James Forsyth

How Number 10 view the state of the negotiations

Earlier today, I sent a message to a contact in Number 10 asking them how the Brexit talks were going. They sent a long reply which I think gives a pretty clear sense of where they think things are. So, in the interest of trying to let people understand where Number 10 reckon the negotiations are, here is their response: ‘The negotiations will probably end this week. Varadkar doesn’t want to negotiate. Varadkar was keen on talking before the Benn Act when he thought that the choice would be ‘new deal or no deal’. Since the Benn Act passed he has gone very cold and in the last week the

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Scottish court: ‘no doubt’ that Boris will abide by law on Brexit extension

Is Boris Johnson on course to request an Article 50 extension within the fortnight? The Court of Session, Scotland’s highest court, has today dismissed a legal effort to force Johnson to comply with the law (dubbed ‘surrender act’ in No. 10) aimed at making the government seek a Brexit extension in the event of a no deal. Only the reason the judge in question ruled that there was no need for ‘coercive orders’ against the UK government is that he said there could be ‘no doubt’ that the prime minister had already agreed to abide by the law – after government documents submitted to the Court of Session said the prime minister would