Politics Archives

Tuesday

30 Jul 2019

Boris Johnson hasn’t learned the lesson of his Brexit referendum win

During the 2016 referendum battle, I consistently said that leaving the EU would make the UK poorer, though probably not as poor in the short term as George Osborne was arguing. But – as I always added night after grinding night on the News at Ten and in a couple of Tonight films I made for ITV – there were other reasons why people might choose Brexit, such as increasing the independent power of Parliament and the courts, or having a greater say over who can come to live and work here. The complaint of Remainers after the election result that ‘no one voted to make themselves poorer’ was a

Damian Thompson

Podcast: How radical Islam taught the progressive Left to blame the Jews

It’s less than four years since Jeremy Corbyn’s hard-left sect seized control of the Labour Party, and yet already its anti-Semitic views – so alien to Labour tradition – seem too deeply rooted to eradicate. Today’s ‘Holy Smoke’ podcast puts this sinister development in the broader context of the ‘Red-Green’ alliance – the love affair between the progressive Left and the Jew-haters of jihadist Islam. On the face of it, this is an unlikely, even surreal, relationship. But as my guest, the historian Richard Landes, argues, the two have something in common: millennialism, the belief that some sort of Heaven on Earth, is not only imminent but historically inevitable. In

Steerpike

Boris’s Mirror Chicken comes home to roost

Boris Johnson has appointed a former Daily Mirror Chicken as his chief spin doctor, the paper’s front page revealed today. Lee Cain, Boris’s new communications director, donned the infamous costume during a stint at the Labour supporting newspaper and began ruffling Tory feathers during the 2010 general election, when he pursued David Cameron round the country. Cain’s recruitment appears to have caused much mirth at the Mirror offices, with one former colleague saying, ‘Lee was actually a great Mirror Chicken. He attacked the role with real zeal and a great passion. I vividly remember him coming in to the newsroom and prancing around still in his full outfit like a

Alex Massie

Can Boris Johnson find a pro-Union, pro-Brexit message?

In yesterday’s Evening Blend newsletter – to which you should sign up – Katy Balls concluded that ‘If the Conservative party is going to continue to prosper in Scotland’ Boris Johnson and Ruth Davidson must, between them, ‘find a way to pitch a pro-Union, pro-Brexit message – and fast.’ Well, indeed. The problem, though, is that outside a relatively small number of fishing communities, there is no obvious pro-Union, pro-Brexit message to be deployed and certainly none that seems likely to prove persuasive. The results of the Brexit referendum rather confirm this. Scotland, as you may have heard, rejected Brexit. True, this was a pan-UK referendum in which the overall

Steerpike

Blackpool Labour candidate’s awkward past

Jeremy Corbyn was in Blackpool today, where he joined a protest against the fracking firm Cuadrilla and launched his ‘Green Industrial Revolution in the North West’. On his trip to the seaside, Corbyn was joined by local Labour politician Chris Webb, who is currently vying to become the MP for Blackpool North and Cleveleys. Webb certainly seemed to be buttering up Corbyn ahead of the visit, and said he was ‘delighted’ that the Labour leader would be joining him at the fracking site. But has Webb always been such an enthusiastic Corbynista on the left of the party? It’s certainly not clear. Mr S has spotted that in an old political leaflet published

Boris Johnson and the end of political spin

Does the arrival of Boris Johnson in Downing Street signal the end of the politics of branding and the beginning of the politics of principle? Can we already see in the announcements and actions of the Johnson Government a new style of politics? The early signs would suggest so. Boris’s first speech outside No.10 was devoid of fluff. The promises – extra police, delivering Brexit on time – were clear and precise and will provide an easy way to judge his record. Another source of optimism is the clear difference between Boris and his predecessor. Whereas May stirred up resentments with misleading gender pay gap publications and talk of burning

Steerpike

Watch: Douglas Murray and Matthew Parris on a no-deal Brexit

Two Spectator contributors were invited on to the BBC’s Newsnight last night to discuss the prospect of Britain leaving the EU without a deal on 31 October. Matthew Parris and Doulgas Murray joined Emily Maitlis in the studio, as the pair discussed the nature of no deal, whether the vote to Leave in 2016 was a true mandate for this kind of Brexit, and what impact it may have on the country. Watch here:

Monday

29 Jul 2019

Steven Fielding

Labour is gearing up for the wrong fight against Boris Johnson

Boris Johnson is sometimes compared to Winston Churchill, not least by the man himself. Unfortunately for Britain’s new Prime Minister, most of these comparisons are fatuous. But there are some similarities. Both are politically fluid and both share an enormous sense of ambition propelling them in unexpected and contrary directions. So far, we have had two Johnsons: One Nation Boris, the expansive liberal Tory, the man who won Labour London, not once but twice. More recently, we’ve has Brexit Boris, whose constituency seems to have been reduced to the hard-faced men and women of Leave. It is Brexit Boris that Jeremy Corbyn’s advisers choose to see: they believe he is an

James Forsyth

Why the EU isn’t taking Boris’s Brexit threat seriously yet

Boris Johnson’s Downing Street is being quite clear that if the EU wants to talk then it needs to be prepared to reopen the withdrawal agreement. If the EU isn’t prepared to budge on this, the message is that there will be no deal. The EU isn’t inclined to take this threat that seriously right now. The view is that parliament will find a way to block the UK leaving without a deal or Boris Johnson will get cold feet. Even if the UK does leave without a deal, many in the EU reckon that within months the UK will be so keen to come back to the table that

Steerpike

The seven biggest losers of Boris Johnson’s premiership

Now that Boris Johnson’s new ministers are in place and the key players in his administration firmly established, the curtain has been decisively drawn over the May era. But who has lost the most and been cast aside in the transition to Boris’s new ‘golden age’? Mr S. presents his pick… Alan Duncan Alan Duncan, who was dubbed Boris’s ‘pooper-scooper’ when they worked together in the Foreign Office, jumped before he was pushed when he resigned as a minister last week. Duncan said he had quit to try and table a motion on the new PM’s ability to command a majority – which he failed in doing. He insisted however

Sunday

28 Jul 2019

Ben Sixsmith

Can the Brexit party survive Brexit?

You have to admit that Brexit party MEPs have a fun job. Imagine turning up to work to insult your colleagues, ridicule your duties and still collect a pay cheque. As I am fortunate enough to enjoy my work, though, I don’t think it is jealousy that makes me find at least some of their posturing obnoxious. “Every day MEPs get a “media briefing” from the EU,” Martin Daubney MEP informs us: No, in fact. If anything, the EU is offering evidence against bias. First, these words came not from an EU employee but British philosopher John Gray. Second, Gray does not call Brexit “far right” and specifically criticises the

Matthew Taylor

Sunday shows round-up: Jeremy Corbyn – I’m not worried about Boris Johnson

Jeremy Corbyn – I’m not worried about Boris Johnson Sophy Ridge travelled to Mansfield earlier in the week for an interview with the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. At the 2017 election, Labour lost Mansfield to the Conservatives after having held the seat for 94 years. Ridge asked Corbyn about how prepared the party was to win the Leave-voting Mansfield back, especially with a new Prime Minister taking the reins: "I've got my summer campaign plan in place, we've got most of our candidates selected in all our marginal constituencies" – Jeremy Corbyn tells #Ridge that he is preparing to take on Boris Johnson in a general election. Read more here:

John Connolly

‘Boris bounce’ puts Farage in the shade

Boris Johnson has two big advantages: the ability to drive his opponents quite mad, and strikingly low expectations. Pick up a newspaper recently and you might have read that Britain is ‘mortified’ to have such a bozo foisted upon the nation by a handful of retired Tories. If that were the case, the opinion polls would show the Tories plunging in popularity. But instead, the reverse has happened. The Conservatives, so recently trailing the Brexit Party, are now comfortably ahead of everyone else. The honeymoon has begun. Three different sets of fresh polling conducted by YouGov, Opinium and Deltapoll (commissioned by the Sunday Times, the Observer and the Mail on

Paul Dacre

My advice to Boris Johnson’s minders

So 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. Thus the Tories, with two women PMs to their credit, have achieved another historic first: scuppering the belief — argued by the Daily Mail in my 26 years as editor — that politicians with scandalous private lives cannot hold high office. I make no comment on this, or about the 31-year-old minx who is the current Boris Johnson bedwarmer, but ask you instead to spare a thought for Petronella’s abortion, Helen’s love child, Marina’s humiliation and her four children’s agony. On which

The Spectator

How Boris can silence his critics again

It’s hard to think of a prime minister who has reached No. 10 with lower expectations. Boris Johnson has been dismissed as a philandering clown, a joker calamitously miscast as prime minister in a moment of national crisis. Obloquy has been hurled at him every time he has taken a new job — from mayor of London to foreign secretary. When he became editor of this magazine, his critics said putting The Spectator into the hands of such an oaf was like asking an ape to look after a Ming vase. At every stage, however, Boris’s critics have been confounded. His jobs change, but his style remains. His belief is that

Saturday

27 Jul 2019

Daniel DePetris

Boris beware: Trump is harder to charm than you think

On the surface, Donald Trump and Boris Johnson look like two peas in a pod. Their hairstyles are blonde and moppy. The height of their collective ambition makes the Empire State Building and Big Ben look puny in comparison. Both are proud and unapologetic of their unconventionality and large personalities. Indeed, Trump was so smitten when his pal Boris won the Tory leadership contest that he paid him the ultimate compliment—comparing the incoming PM to himself. The general consensus thus far is that Donald and Boris will get along like Thelma and Louise. Woody Johnson, Trump’s man in London, told the Guardian, ‘Both these leaders have their own style, but they have similarities and

Isabel Hardman

Can the Gaukeward Squad overcome its inner turmoil?

Usually after a big government reshuffle, the happiest-looking people are the ministers, whether they’ve survived the axe or are celebrating a promotion. But at the end of this week, the most cheerful MPs appear to be the ones who left government, whether of their own volition or after being sacked by Boris Johnson. They’ve been spotted at the cricket and are happily announcing their holiday plans with their family on social media in a way that most politicians shy away from, for fear of appearing to have too much fun. But who is really in the best situation: those in the government, or those now on the outside? In my

Katy Balls

Inside Dominic Cummings’ first meeting with government aides

When Boris Johnson was interviewed by The Spectator ahead of becoming Prime Minister, he said that on Brexit, his ‘determination burns with a magnesium brightness to get it done and to deliver’. Less than a week into his premiership and that commitment is echoed by senior No. 10 staff – many of whom come from Vote Leave. With speculation mounting that an early election is now inevitable as Brussels refuse to take Johnson’s Brexit demands seriously, special advisers and government officials gathered on Friday evening to hear from Johnson’s senior adviser Dominic Cummings – referred to by No. 10 staff as the CEO. I understand the Friday 6pm meeting is

James Forsyth

Boris Johnson’s political strategy is the same as his Brexit strategy

Boris Johnson is running an outside / in campaign, I say in The Sun this morning.. If he’s to get the UK out of the EU by October 31st—the defining pledge of his leadership bid—then he’s got to get the public to put pressure on parliament. The new Prime Minister needs MPs to think that they’ll pay an electoral price for standing in his way. That’s why he is in full campaign mode: firing out popular policies, touring the country and making big speeches. A sizable poll bounce would mean that MPs would be far less likely to try and throw obstacles in Boris Johnson’s way. After all, what’s the

Katy Balls

The leadership result that has Labour worried

As the Westminster rumour mill goes into overdrive over the likelihood of an early general election, talk has turned to how the main parties would fare in an Autumn trip to the polls. Crucial to that question is how the Liberal Democrats would do. Just a year ago, the Lib Dems were the subject of pity and widespread mockery. They were scarred by their time in coalition with the Tories. They failed to make much ground during the 2017 snap election, ending up with just 12 MPs, and seemed destined for extinction. In theory, they should have hoovered up Remain voters. Instead, they hoovered up derision and obloquy. Sir Vince