Politics

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

Tuesday

25 Feb 2025

Starmer’s defence spending hike isn’t enough

The prime minister has told the House of Commons that defence spending will rise to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027. The UK already spends 2.3 per cent, so this works out as an increase of £13.4 billion a year. It will largely be funded by substantial cuts to the international aid budget. It is good that Sir Keir Starmer has got the memo on the desperate need to increase the defence budget. But the memo is dated ‘early 2024’: it was last April, after all, that Rishi Sunak pledged to increase defence spending to 2.5 per cent. The UK’s current spending is not just inadequate to meet the increasing security

James Heale

Starmer timed his defence announcement to perfection

Politics is a matter of timing – and Keir Starmer perfected today. Barely two hours after Kemi Badenoch’s big foreign affairs speech, the Prime Minister has stolen the headlines off her in a textbook example of the difference between fruitless opposition and the possibilities of government. While the Tory leader could only muse on the need for higher defence spending post-2030, Starmer just went ahead and announced he wants 3 per cent spending of GDP in the next parliament. Under Starmer’s plans, current expenditure will rise from 2.3 per cent to 2.5 per cent by 2027. The additional £13.4 billion a year, he claimed in the Commons, will come in

Michael Gove

Is Kemi Badenoch a ‘realist’?

15 min listen

Kemi Badenoch has today given a major speech outlining the Conservatives’ commitment to ‘realism’ in their foreign policy. She said, ‘You cannot help others if you cannot help yourself’, and that the sovereignty and strength of Britain matters ‘above all’. She also pressed Keir Starmer to push defence spending north of the 2.5 per cent target and – as if it was all choreographed – the prime minister dutifully has, announcing in the Commons that defence spending will reach 3 per cent of GDP by the end of the next parliament. This will come at the expense of the foreign aid budget, another suggestion that the leader of the opposition

Matthew Lynn

Trump is doing us a favour by targeting our dreadful tech laws

It will be an unacceptable intrusion on our sovereignty. And it will pave the way for American domination of the internet. Ministers will no doubt be appalled by the suggestion by President Trump that he will impose tariffs on the UK if we don’t rip all the tech legislation that he doesn’t like, especially if that is driven by his new friends in Silicon Valley. But hold on. Sure, the interference in our domestic regulation is unwelcome. And yet, Donald Trump may also be doing us a favour – we have passed some terrible legislation and we would be better off without it. The UK may soon face tariffs from

Steerpike

Watch: Starmer apologises over defence statement leak

Uh oh. Sir Keir Starmer made a big statement in the Commons today on raising defence spending – but before the Prime Minister could get started, his party faced a rather big telling off from the Speaker about following the ministerial code. As Lindsay Hoyle explained to parliamentarians, texts of ministerial statements should be provided in advance to the opposition and the Speaker. Slamming the party of government for first redacting parts of the text, the Speaker then attacked Labour over reports that ‘some of the redacted information was provided to the media’ and called for a probe into the matter. Oo er. Starmer was quick to apologise, insisting to

Steerpike

Starmer to raise defence spending to 2.5%

To the Commons, where Sir Keir Starmer has just made a rather big announcement on the issue of defence. The Prime Minister took to the Chamber today to announce to parliamentarians that Labour will raise Britain’s defence spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027 – with a commitment to hit 3 per cent by 2034 if his party wins a second term. Golly! It wasn’t all spending increases, however. The PM announced that the proposed 0.2 per cent rise for defence over the next two years would see a cut to foreign aid spending – from 0.5 per cent of GDP to 0.3 per cent. ‘It is not

Daniel Rey

Cinema doesn’t have to be stuck in a loop

If you’ve recently been to the cinema or turned on your streaming platform of choice, no doubt you’ll have been offered ‘new’ stories that are fundamentally familiar. From Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, to Dune: Part Two, and now Bridget Jones 4 – the film industry is being driven by franchises and sequels. Of the top 10 highest-grossing films released in Britain in 2024, franchises and sequels accounted for nine. The exception, Wicked, was a prequel. Despite innumerable creative possibilities, studios are flogging offshoots of things we’ve either already watched or already rejected. The trend is driven by one thing: money. Hollywood likes to present itself as an artistic community, underwritten by great ideas and

Michael Simmons

The energy price cap rise heaps more misery on Brits

Average gas and electricity bills will rise by £111 a year in April after the regulator Ofgem announced an increase to the energy price cap. The 6.4 per cent hike means the average dual-fuel household bill will hit £1,849 annually. The rise is more than anticipated, with analysts at Cornwall Insight predicting that bills would rise by just 5 per cent in April. Ofgem blamed inflation and ‘rising global wholesale prices’ for the bigger-than-expected increase. As a result, the cap will be £159 (nearly 10 per cent) higher than for the April to June period last year. The rise in energy prices is why the Bank of England recently forecast

James Heale

Is there any substance to Kemi’s ‘conservative realism’?

Kemi Badenoch set out her world view in a speech this morning at Policy Exchange. As protesting tractors blared their horns outside, inside the room the Tory leader was sounding the alarm for the post-Cold War order. The UK, she warned, faces a ‘bitter reckoning’ unless it wakes up to the fact that ‘it is no longer 1995.’ With threats growing at home and abroad, too much focus had been placed on values at the expense of interests. Instead, Badenoch argued, ‘conservative realism’ was needed – with a hard-headed, realistic approach to different spheres. Watching in attendance was the historian Niall Ferguson, whose warning about countries spending more on debt

Ross Clark

Why BP is ditching renewables

Among the big, bad oil companies in borstal for environmental offenses, BP has long been the relatively benign one, the class pet. Remember how former chief executive Lord Browne two decades ago promised to take the company ‘Beyond Petroleum’ to a golden future of clean energy? In 2004, in a forerunner of the ESG indices which are commonplace today, Goldman Sachs picked out the company as the most environmentally and socially aware of all oil companies. BP was supposed to be the one which was best-placed to manage a transition to cleaner energy, which, according to Goldman Sachs, would reduce risks for the company and boost returns for shareholders. But

Steerpike

Assisted dying committee votes down palliative amendment

Back to Kim Leadbeater’s assisted dying bill, which continues to undergo scrutiny as it makes its passage through parliament. This morning, the bill committee gathered to further discuss the legislation – and, in yet another baffling move, MPs voted by almost two to one against an amendment that would have required a patient to be consulted about palliative care options before undergoing assisted suicide. Good heavens… The amendment tabled by Labour MP Rachael Maskell requested that the wording of the bill was changed, to say that the patient should have ‘met with a palliative care specialist for the purposes of being informed about the medical and care support options’. The

Oleksiy Kosach

Trump – not Zelensky – is Ukraine’s only hope

I have known Volodymyr Zelensky very well for years. As a senior official personally appointed by Zelensky, I spoke to him many times a day and observed him closely both in public and privately. We parted on good terms and without rancour. I have no personal axe to grind. But today I cannot remain silent about how Zelensky is weakening Ukraine under the guise of war. As a result of this new climate of fear I must write these words under the veil of anonymity – a necessary precaution against retaliation from the very regime I once served. It pains me to admit that at least some of what Donald Trump

Daria Kaleniuk

Donald Trump is utterly wrong about Ukraine’s leadership

The Anti-corruption Action Centre, the NGO I chair, is probably one of the loudest watchdogs in Ukraine that is monitoring President Volodymyr Zelensky and his administration. We expose corruption, advocate for comprehensive rule-of-law reforms, and demand better governance – even during war. For over a decade we have built anti-corruption infrastructure in Ukraine, and endured persecution for simply carrying out our work. We want to strengthen Ukrainian institutions and build a more effective, resilient democracy. It’s unacceptable for any foreign leader (even of the United States) to humiliate our president, decide on behalf of the Ukrainian people that we should hold elections, and spread falsehoods about who started the war.

Isabel Hardman

Amanda Pritchard resigns as NHS boss

Amanda Pritchard is resigning as chief executive of NHS England, after three years in the job. Pritchard’s announcement, in the last few minutes, is not a huge surprise given there had not been a great deal of confidence among ministers and aides in the leadership of the NHS – though it is worth pointing out that this lack of confidence was not solely focused on Pritchard. Pritchard’s departure leaves Streeting and colleagues more exposed Pritchard had been very anxious to show that she was ready and willing to implement the reforms that Labour wanted to introduce, particularly the shift from acute, hospital-based care to preventive and community services. But she

Gavin Mortimer

Trump and Macron’s backslapping masks a rocky relationship

It would be a stretch to describe Emmanuel Macron’s meeting with Donald Trump as a ‘bromance’, but there were plenty of warm handshakes and even warmer words, with the French president at one moment addressing his host as ‘Dear Donald’. Macron had flown to Washington on Monday to press the case for Europe in the upcoming negotiations between the USA and Russia over the war in Ukraine. The two presidents had a two-hour virtual meeting with leaders from the G7 along with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. Macron and Trump then held a press conference during which the President of France declared that ‘after speaking with President Trump, I fully

James Hanson

The endless entitlement of Waspi women

In this godforsaken era of feigned victimhood, is there any group less worthy of our sympathy than the Waspi women? Having been, rightly, denied compensation by the government in December, they are now threatening legal action unless they are given a payout. Will their entitlement never end? It’s hard to know where to start with this dreadful campaign. Their name alone should be considered a breach of the trade descriptions act. ‘Women Against State Pension Inequality’ suggests they’re campaigning against some great disparity. Except they’re not. They’re just angry that the inequality from which they historically benefited has come to end. ‘Women Against State Pension Equality’ would be a more

Steerpike

Watch: Trump and Macron share awkward handshake

Donald Trump and Emmanuel Macron have some odd history. The US president and his French counterpart don’t particularly see eye to eye and their strained relations have, over the years, been reflected in a series of rather intense handshakes – with one lasting for a full 29 seconds during a 2017 encounter. Crikey. Their meeting on Monday was similar. The duo met to discuss European plans for peace in Ukraine, including the possibility of deploying western troops in Kyiv, after joining a call with other G7 leaders on the matter. The meet followed the US president’s claim that Britain and France had ‘done nothing’ to end the war in Ukraine –

Sam Meadows

The reason Javier Milei is releasing Argentina’s secret Nazi files

In the Oscar-nominated movie The Holdovers, one of the characters says in a moment of frustration: ‘I thought all the Nazis ran away to Argentina.’ This line got a big laugh in cinemas in Buenos Aires. But while the events this joke alludes to now lie far enough in the past for today’s Argentines to chuckle at, the flight of Nazis to its shores remains an extremely uncomfortable period in the history of the South American country. Many former Nazi officers and party members fled Europe for South America in the years after the war and Argentina became a popular destination. Estimates for how many Nazis settled in the country

Jonathan Miller

Donald Trump humiliated Emmanuel Macron

The orca killer whale is known for playing with its prey before killing it, always with a smile. An image that came to mind on Monday when French President Emmanuel Macron arrived at the White House to plead the cause of Ukraine to a grinning President Donald Trump. The French media is dutifully repeating the Elysée line that Macron had rekindled a bromance with the American president, but this is disconnected from reality. Macron returns to Paris today with, as far as I can tell, nothing but platitudes. This was nothing like Macron’s visits to Washington during the Biden administration, when the French president used to deal with Biden’s sympathetic secretary

Chas Newkey-Burden

Is ‘catch and release’ fishing really ethical?

Ask anyone if they think that cruelty to animals is OK and they’ll say no – but are they being truthful? If they eat meat, they’ll insist that the meat they eat is ‘high-welfare’, but 85 per cent of the UK’s farmed animals endured their shortened lives on brutal factory farms, so nearly everyone who says their meat is ‘high welfare’ is telling porkies. Fishing is growing in popularity and there are similarly hollow boasts from those who sit by the riverside. According to the Angling Trust, thousands of young people have been awarded rod licences over the last couple of years and angling influencers now share drone footage