Politics Archives

Saturday

4 May 2019

Steerpike

Gavin Williamson’s cheerful goodbye

When the former defence secretary Gavin Williamson was fired from his position on Wednesday, for allegedly leaking information related to Huawei, China hawks in the Cabinet lost a key ally in their fight against the company’s involvement in the UK 5G network. The defence secretary was said to be one of five Cabinet ministers against Huawei’s bid, with Jeremy Hunt, Liam Fox, Sajid Javid and Penny Mordaunt also allegedly wary of the company’s closeness to the Chinese state, and the possibility it could use the network to spy on UK citizens. But while they may have been disappointed to lose another voice in Cabinet against the Chinese telecoms behemoth, elsewhere in

Friday

3 May 2019

Katy Balls

The Kate Hoey Edition

32 min listen

Kate Hoey is a Labour MP for Vauxhall, having been in that role for 30 years. Hoey talks to Katy Balls about growing up in Northern Ireland, fighting to win her current seat in Vauxhall, and how she developed a reputation as a rebel in her party.

Tom Lowe

The key battlegrounds to watch in the 2019 local elections

The Tories are braced for a drubbing in today’s local elections, but with the bar set so low will things be as bad as expected for the party? In the lead-up to the vote, Conservatives have been somewhat sheepish on the doorsteps – hardly a surprise, perhaps, given the fallout from Brexit. So will Tory voters stay away? Or will they switch sides to Labour? The mood across Britain is certainly febrile, and after three years of chaos in Westminster, it could be the smaller parties – the Greens, Ukip and the Lib Dems – who see the biggest gains. Here are the results to watch out for: Midnight Broxbourne: The

Robert Peston

The Brexit political earthquake is only just beginning

These are the most extraordinary local elections of my lifetime. The Tories’ loss of more than 1,000 councillors is way worse than the gloomiest projections. And yet Labour should be as depressed as the government because the fact that it is losing more than 100 seats, and its share of the vote is broadly the same as the Tories’ is devastating for it, when arguably this is the most shambolic government in modern history and the comparator elections are the 2015 Ed Miliband lowpoint. And although Brexit is one explanation for both parties’ poor performance, for Labour in particular it is a million miles from being the whole explanation –

Cindy Yu

The Spectator Podcast: the Brexit party, drugs, and fake lesbians

As the two main parties reel from their local election performances today, are we at the beginning of a golden age for smaller parties? James Forsyth evaluates the chances of the Brexit party – Nigel Farage’s new electoral outfit – in this week’s cover piece. The conclusion isn’t pretty for the Conservative party: the Brexit party is slicker than Ukip ever was, and two out of five Tory councillors are considering voting for them in the upcoming European elections. The party has also managed to perform better than Change UK, who seemed to have peaked at their launch a few months ago, demonstrating – James argues – the sheer anger

James Forsyth

How the Tories can turn their dire election results around

The local election results are dire for both the Tories and Labour. The Tories have lost over a thousand seats—and that is with the Brexit Party not standing in these elections. If Nigel Farage’s new party had been on the ballot paper, who knows how bad the Tory loses would have been. But at the same time, Labour—after nine years in opposition and coming from the low base of 2015—are going backwards. They have, so far, lost council seats. The two main parties are, in national projected vote share, tied on 28 per cent of the vote. This is a reminder of just how much of an ugly baby contest

Isabel Hardman

Ministers shouldn’t be able to escape their mistakes

There is little doubt that Rory Stewart is amply-qualified for his belated promotion to the cabinet. The new International Development Secretary also has a background that means he understands what his brief actually does, and its value. But his move from the Ministry of Justice has also prompted a round of complaining that Stewart will not be held accountable for a pledge that he made. When he became prisons minister, Stewart set himself a deadline of 12 months in which to reduce levels of drug use and violence in 10 struggling prisons. If he failed, he promised, he would resign. At the time, it seemed rather obvious that Stewart would

Steerpike

Baldrick quits Labour

Things are going from bad to worse for Jeremy Corbyn. Labour has had a dismal night in the polls, losing nearly 100 councillors when the party had hoped to make gains at the Tories’ expense. And now Tony Robinson – the actor best known for playing Baldrick in Blackadder – has said he is quitting Labour after nearly 50 years. Here is his verdict on the party: Can things get any more miserable for Jeremy Corbyn? As an exasperated Blackadder might say, I think the phrase rhymes with Clucking Bell…

Steerpike

Jeremy Hunt’s human touch

MPs often struggle to bring out their human side when they’re on social media. Often, while ministers would like to give the impression that they are personally sending out warm replies and heartfelt facebook messages, in reality they have dedicated advisors writing posts for them. It seems that Jeremy Hunt might have been caught out by this today, when he sought to congratulate the NHS campaigner Deb Hazeldine on receiving her MBE. Presumably copying and pasting a message sent from an advisor, Hunt accidentally tweeted out that: ‘How about: Deb I am so sorry you and your mum had to suffer so much but she would be so proud of the

Brendan O’Neill

Tommy Robinson and the double standards of political violence

So it’s acceptable now to assault electoral candidates? That’s the pretty scary take-home message from the Tommy Robinson ‘milkshaking’ incidents. Journalists and even politicians have been going wild for the bloke in Warrington who threw his milkshake in Robinson’s face yesterday as he was out campaigning as an independent for the upcoming Euro elections. It’s the second time this week Robinson was milkshaked. It will no doubt become a trend. ‘Milkshake a fascist.’ Videos of the incidents have gone viral and even Tory MPs have cheered the strawberry-flavoured assaulters. Johnny Mercer said the attacks made him ‘#lovebritain’. He later apologised, perhaps realising it isn’t a good idea for a member

Joe Burgis

The local elections convinced me that reversing Brexit is wrong

On Thursday morning I left the house earlier than usual. I rode round the corner, through the driving Mancunian rain to a church hall. The people inside looked glad to see me. One asked for my address and then handed me a piece of paper. He ushered me to the centre of the hall where there were four shabby booths. I made my way to the nearest and cast my vote. Given the magnitude and impact of recent democratic exercises, the local elections might seem relatively inconsequential. But the act of voting remains significant, no matter the scale of the ballot. The experience is reminiscent of going to confession –

Steerpike

‘Why don’t you resign?’: Theresa May heckled at Welsh Tory conference

The Tories are reeling after a dismal performance in the local elections overnight and things aren’t getting any better for Theresa May today. The Prime Minister has just taken to her feet at the Welsh Conservative conference but as she did so she was shouted down by a heckler calling for her to go: ‘Why don’t you resign? We don’t want you’ Oh dear. Still, this isn’t the worst thing that has happened to May when she has delivered a Tory conference speech…

Steerpike

Barry Gardiner: Labour is trying to ‘bail out’ the Tories on Brexit

It’s always been the case that politics makes strange bedfellows, but even so, the current cross-party Brexit talks between Labour and the Conservatives have produced the oddest couple in a long time: Jeremy Corbyn and Theresa May. One wants to remould the capitalist order, the other simply wants to survive as party leader until Christmas. Yet while they’ve worked together to break the Brexit impasse, both sides have made great efforts to downplay to their supporters that they are siding with their hated opponents across the aisle. But it appears that Labour’s Barry Gardiner wasn’t sticking to the script when he appeared on BBC News today. As he got into

Robert Peston

The reason for Labour’s dismal local election performance

At the end of today, the Tory party will have had a terrible night – perhaps losing as many as 1,000 councillors in England, compared with a worst-case projection (by Tory peer Rob Hayward) of 800 defeats. But that may not end up being the big news: it is not exactly a revelation that vast numbers of Tory supporters are incandescent that the Prime Minister has failed to deliver Brexit yet. A majority of Tory MPs wanted Theresa May to resign before yesterday’s elections; they still want her out. Nothing has changed, as she would say. Much more significant is that Labour too is losing seats. And even though the

Fraser Nelson

The LibDems are back – with their strongest advance since 1995

The biggest winners from last night are the Liberal Democrats who have (so far) won 260 seats – their best overall performance since 2003 and the highest number of gains since 1995. And this matters because the rationale of Change UK (the latest name for the Chuka Ununna-Anna Soubry group of breakaway MPs) is that the Lib Dems are bust, useless as a vehicle for centrist Remainers. This may have seemed true in the 2017 general election, but does not seem to be true now. They have taken Chelmsford, Cotswold, Winchester and North Norfolk – amongst others. Meanwhile, ChUK is a disgraceful shambles – unable to agree on a logo

Steerpike

Watch: Dawn Butler blames ‘biased media projection’ for Labour losses

Today’s local election results are not a good look for Labour. After nine years of a Conservative Prime Minister leading the country, and the Tory party currently collapsing over its handling of Brexit, you would expect an opposition party to be triumphing in elections at this stage Yet as the local election results currently stand, the party has actually lost council seats across the country. Fortunately help was on hand last night, to explain why the party was doing so badly. Labour’s shadow equalities minister was on BBC news, and used the opportunity to explain to the audience that it wasn’t Labour’s hopeless leadership, unintelligible Brexit position, or ongoing anti-Semitism

Steerpike

Boris Johnson gets the vote out

With widespread dissatisfaction across the country with the Tory party’s handling of Brexit, a key concern for CCHQ ahead of the local elections last night was turnout, and the risk that their supporters would simply stay at home. So it makes sense that at 8pm yesterday, with only two hours until the polls closed, a full-scale effort was being made to get reluctant voters to head to their polling stations. Joining the effort was Uxbridge and South Ruislip MP and former London Mayor Boris Johnson, who helpfully tweeted out that: ‘I just voted Conservative in the local elections. Make sure you do too! You’ve got two hours left to get

Katy Balls

Corbyn under pressure to change Brexit stance after disappointing Labour result

It’s been a disappointing night for both main parties in the local elections. As predicted, the Conservatives have suffered serious losses and could be on course to lose around 800 council seats by the time all votes have been counted. Perhaps more surprising is Labour’s bad turn. The party has suffered a net loss of seats taking a hit in Leave areas like Sunderland, Ashfield and Bolsover. This is not the performance one would expect from a party on course for a majority in a general election. Labour councillors and politicians have been quick to start the blame game. After Labour lost ten seats in Sunderland, the party’s council leader Graeme

Tom Goodenough

Tories lose over 1300 seats in local elections

The Tories have lost over 1000 seats as both major parties were hit by a Brexit backlash in the local elections overnight. The Conservatives are down 1323 councillors, while Labour lost 77 representatives compared to 2015. Theresa May said voters had sent the ‘simple message’ that her party had to ‘get on’ with delivering Brexit. Labour’s shadow chancellor John McDonnell said the results were a clear sign of voter dissatisfaction over Brexit: Labour’s council leader in Barnsley, Stephen Houghton, echoed McDonnell’s message: ‘We have been out and about across the borough and the message we are getting loud and clear is all about Brexit, and the residents are telling us they

Thursday

2 May 2019

The Spectator

How to lose elections

When a political party is in trouble, we see infighting, leak inquiries, resignations, mass loss of council seats, dismissals and botched attempts to depose the leader. But when a party implodes, something different happens: it loses the ability to defend or explain itself. An imploding party can and will lose any argument, no matter how strong its track record. The Tories entered this terminal stage under John Major after the disastrous local elections of 1995, which were followed by their landslide defeat of 1997. With the party now having had its worst set of election since 1995, it looks very much like they might be entering it again. When John