Politics

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

Monday

The Spectator

Live: Budget 2018 – Philip Hammond announces the end of austerity

Philip Hammond has delivered his final Budget before Brexit. The Chancellor said that the era of austerity is coming to an end as he pledged extra cash for no deal preparations and slapped a digital services tax on tech giants such as Facebook and Google. He also revealed that the OBR has upped its growth forecast to 1.6 per cent for 2019/20. Here are the key announcements: Government abolishes the use of Private Finance Initiatives Extra £420m to repair potholes An extra £20.5bn for the NHS over the next five years A further £500m for the Housing Infrastructure Fund Fuel, beer, cider, spirits duties all frozen E-passport gates at UK

Sunday

Steerpike Steerpike

Philip Hammond’s scheduling problem

Budget day is upon us and it’s safe to say that expectations have been set rather low when it comes to Philip Hammond’s big moment. The Chancellor has said he plans to remain a fiscal hawk – and warned that there will be a brand new Budget in the new year should a ‘no deal’ Brexit occur. Perhaps then it’s little wonder that the schedulers at the BBC don’t seem to regard the event as a showstopper event. In fact, the Times’s Patrick Kidd wonders if they are trying to send a message. During BBC2’s Budget coverage, BBC1 will be showing ‘Money for Nothing’, ‘Flog it!’ and ‘Pointless’: By around 5pm,

Matthew Taylor

Sunday Roundup – Philip Hammond – A ‘no deal’ Brexit would mean a new budget

With the Budget due on Monday, today’s highlights have come chiefly from the leading Treasury figures of the two major parties. Sophy Ridge was joined this morning by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Hammond, who is known to be wary about the UK’s impending departure from the EU’s economic framework, told Ridge that tomorrow’s Budget would not be the last we’d hear from him if the Brexit negotiations break down: PH: If we were to leave the European Union without any deal – I think that’s an extremely unlikely situation, but of course we have to prepare – then we would need to take a different approach to the future

Charles Moore Charles Moore

Violent metaphors in politics are nothing new

There is much shock professed about the metaphors used to describe Mrs May’s political plight — talk of the ‘killing zone’, or her being stabbed, and worse. I feel this shock myself, but in fact such metaphors are routine in politics and almost always have been. Think, for example, of Harold Macmillan’s ‘Night of the Long Knives’ — arguably more tasteless, since it compared a cabinet reshuffle with a Nazi murder spree. The real reason it seems shocking in this case surely, as it did when John McDonnell favourably invoked people who wanted to lynch Esther McVey, is that it is men speaking about a woman. On this, old-fashioned chivalry

Saturday

Noreen O’Donovan Hage

It makes sense to keep Northern Ireland inside the customs union

Sir: What James Forsyth calls ‘the EU plan’ to keep Northern Ireland in the customs union after Brexit (‘The Irish problem’, 20 October) would no more ‘ease Northern Ireland away from the UK and push it more towards Dublin’s orbit’ than it has already done itself through numerous legislative differences. With regard to social issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage, Northern Ireland is far closer to the Republic (as it once was) than to the rest of the UK. It would therefore be no great stretch to avoid awkwardness of land border checks (and respect the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement) by having such checks at the sea ports.

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Will Hammond take this Budget opportunity?

Monday’s Budget comes at a delicate point in the Brexit negotiations. I say in The Sun this morning, that a bolder government and Chancellor would turn this timing to their advantage. They would use this Budget to give a preview of what the UK would do in the event of no deal. No deal planning shouldn’t just be about logistics, but about how the UK would respond economically to this challenge. Philip Hammond could announce that if it is ‘no deal’ the UK would slash to zero tariffs on manufactured goods from all around the world, bring in complete tax relief on all business investment for the next three years

Friday

Zuzanna Mroz

Take it from a trans person: Corbyn is wrong about self-ID

If there’s one thing trans women really don’t need in our lives, it’s bollocks – but that’s exactly what the Labour Party is offering us. Last week, Jeremy Corbyn used a speech at the Pinknews Awards to announce that it is now official Labour policy to give literally any person the right to self-declare their legal gender – something that would make the process of changing one’s gender as simple as ticking a box on an administrative form. For those who don’t make a habit of following trans trends, Corbyn’s speech was in reference to the Government’s controversial consultation on reforming the Gender Recognition Act (which sets out the process

Simon Mcvicker

The Chancellor must not betray business with another attack on the self-employed

The Conservatives used to be known as the party of business. Theresa May still seems to be trying to keep up the pretence, saying in her conference speech that the Conservatives are ‘a party that believes in business’. But the proof is in the pudding, and this pudding is turning sour. Fast. The Budget rumour mill is in overdrive that Chancellor Philip Hammond will use the Budget to extend the government’s disastrous changes to self-employed IR35 tax law from the public sector to the private sector. However Theresa May’s speechwriters may spin this, it would be the final nail in the coffin of the Conservatives’ small business credentials. Let me

Cindy Yu Cindy Yu

The Spectator Podcast: has Brett Kavanagh cost Democrats their midterm victory?

Somehow it has already been two years into a Trump presidency, and America is facing midterm elections. Will Democrats win in a landslide? We also delve a little deeper at the political faultlines behind the Jamal Khashoggi story – is Turkey taking advantage of his death? And last, is the use of wild animals in circuses really the great injustice that campaigners say it is? America is going to the polls again. This November, the House of Representatives and a third of the Senate are facing re-election in the mid-terms. Some predict that the Democrats will win in a landslide and retake control of the currently Republican Congress. But Freddy

Charles Moore Charles Moore

Nick Clegg’s move to Facebook makes perfect sense

Do you remember that brief couple of weeks in British history when we all had to say ‘I agree with Nick’? It seems a long time ago, and now Sir Nick Clegg is off to Silicon Valley to be the head of Facebook’s global affairs and communications team. Some sneer, but the move makes perfect sense. Correctly clocking that he has no future in British politics, and that the European Union is not an area of growth and opportunity, he thinks that the United States has a brighter future than our common European home. I agree with Nick. This article is an extract from Charles Moore’s Spectator notes, available in

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters | 25 October 2018

Irish problem Sir: What James Forsyth calls ‘the EU plan’ to keep Northern Ireland in the customs union after Brexit (‘The Irish problem’, 20 October) would no more ‘ease Northern Ireland away from the UK and push it more towards Dublin’s orbit’ than it has already done itself through numerous legislative differences. With regard to social issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage, Northern Ireland is far closer to the Republic (as it once was) than to the rest of the UK. It would therefore be no great stretch to avoid awkwardness of land border checks (and respect the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement) by having such checks at the

The Spectator

Hammond’s House of Horrors

What is the point of Philip Hammond? Most chancellors have an agenda, but it’s hard to discern any purpose or direction from the current one. Gordon Brown’s project was to oversee the largest expansion of government spending in peacetime history — which he achieved, albeit with ruinous results. George Osborne spoke about trying to wind this programme back. The results were decidedly mixed, but at least he had an idea about what he sought to achieve. Mr Hammond, by contrast, has spent his time in the brace position preparing for Brexit. When he delivers his Budget on Monday, he might have to admit that the country does not seem to

Charles Moore Charles Moore

The Spectator’s Notes | 25 October 2018

Mrs May says she is taking her stand on the issue of Northern Ireland and the integrity of the United Kingdom. If so, good; but it cannot be the whole truth. After all, she surrendered on the Irish border issue in negotiations last December until, at the very last minute, the DUP forced her to row back. I think the irreducible core of her position is something which she does not fully disclose: that she is determined to keep Britain in the customs union, though perhaps only approximately and certainly by another name. This cannot work, surely, because to the EU it is ‘cherry-picking’ and to the Brexiteers it is

Will Stone

Morwenstowe

The first time I encountered Morwenstowe on Cornwall’s north coast I was alone. It was early spring and the church wore a fresh skirt of primroses. As I crossed the stone stile next to the lych-gate, the churchyard inclining before me, I glimpsed beyond the sturdy grey church tower a triangle of greenish blue, a patch of sea tantalisingly held between the sides of the combe. The faint but undying roar of the Atlantic rolled in across the pastureland. Here was a scene of raw beauty preserved by isolation, a fortuitous harmony of landscape, architecture and perspective where something of the spiritual, the poetic undeniably lingered. Now in early autumn

Steerpike Steerpike

Sir Philip Green named in parliament as the #MeToo businessman

The British press has been unable to name the famous businessman who has taken out an injunction against the Daily Telegraph to prevent it reporting on the multiple allegations of sexual harassment, racist abuse and bullying against him. But such laws do not apply to parliament where, in the House of Lords, Peter Hain named this person today as Sir Philip Green. This matters because the law does allow journalists to report (but not comment on) what is said in parliament. So we can now therefore print what Lord Hain told peers today: ‘Someone intimately involved in the case of a powerful businessman using non-disclosure agreements and substantial payments to conceal the truth about

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Why a no-confidence vote in Theresa May could be closer than she thinks

The consensus in the Conservative party is that Theresa May’s visit to the 1922 Committee last night hasn’t materially changed anything. Those who want her gone are still plotting her demise. A larger group of her MPs are very frustrated and unhappy. And there are still a good number of loyalists prepared to make supportive noises about the Prime Minister in the Chamber or ‘crunch’ meetings like the one last night. What this does suggest is that there won’t be another flood of letters calling for a vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister, though the working theory remains that it is more likely that the threshold of 48

Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: Alan Sugar’s second referendum confusion

On his television show the Apprentice, Alan Sugar is known for taking his contestants to task, whether they’re pitching a hopeless product or simply talking absolute rubbish. But the businessman clearly has a bit of a blindspot when it comes to his own incoherence. In a speech in the House of Lords this afternoon, the peer put forward his views on a People’s Vote and the possibility of a second Brexit referendum: ‘A People’s Vote on the outcome of the negotiations of the UK withdrawal from the EU. Well, personally that sounds like, I don’t like the outcome of the original vote, so I’d like another bite of the cherry

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Tensions flare as Cabinet members are accused of politicising the backstop

If you want to know how fractious things are getting in the Cabinet just consider this. On Tuesday, as I report in the new issue of the magazine, Claire Perry, the energy minister, accused others in the Cabinet of using the discussion over the backstop to advance their own leadership ambitions. This is a remarkable charge to hurl against a fellow member of the Cabinet. Those present took this barb to be aimed at Jeremy Hunt. He had led the charge on the need for an escape clause from the backstop that the EU couldn’t unilaterally stop the UK from triggering. But, in a rather comic turn, the Foreign Secretary

Steerpike Steerpike

Listen: John McDonnell’s disastrous Today programme interview

Oh dear. Shadow chancellor John McDonnell’s interview on the Today programme started off a little oddly this morning, with the presenters noting how rough he looked in the studio – apparently he had tripped over fly-tipped rubbish outside his house. The Labour MP joked that although he was arriving rather than leaving the studio looking roughed-up, John Humphreys will ‘beat me up anyway, won’t he?’ Clearly, it was a sign of things to come.  The interview began with Labour’s huge spending proposals, and how they would square this with their supposed promise to reduce the deficit. His answer – increased tax revenues – wasn’t fooling anyone. McDonnell was then taken

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Even ministers don’t understand Brexit

The Brexit negotiations are becoming so complicated that even the cabinet admits that it doesn’t understand what is going on. The Prime Minister has been told by several of her colleagues that they won’t back any deal she agrees until they have seen written legal advice, setting out what it means. If a Brexit deal is going to be impenetrable even to secretaries of state who have followed every step of the negotiations, what hope does the public have? This extraordinary state of affairs was summed up by the cabinet meeting this week during which ministers discussed where the negotiations stand. Theresa May would agree on the money to pay