Politics

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

Thursday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

A wake-up call for Parliament

Parliament is the cockpit of the nation, but MPs have been on autopilot rather a lot in the past 40-odd years. Ever since the United Kingdom joined the European Economic Community, more and more powers have been passed away from Parliament to Brussels and its institutions. Brexit will see these powers come flowing back to Westminster. So it was appropriate that the Supreme Court has decided that Parliament must legislate for the triggering of Article 50, the two-year process by which this country will leave the EU. For MPs to vote against Article 50 would be to vote against the referendum result itself; it says nothing about the terms on

Martin Vander Weyer Martin Vander Weyer

Is Mrs May’s industrial strategy just another misguided missile?

The Prime Minister’s heralded ‘industrial strategy’ was robbed of headlines by the story of the misguided Trident missile. But it was perhaps as well that the 132-page green paper — with its ‘ten pillars’ of platitude about ‘delivering affordable energy and clean growth’, ‘improving procurement’ and all the rest — garnered so little attention, because even the business voices who were waiting to welcome it were quick to spot it as no more than a wordy discussion draft, bereft of substantive ideas. Nevertheless, as Mrs May says, to have an industrial strategy at all represents ‘a new approach to government, not just stepping back and leaving business to get on

Liam Halligan

Keynes’s grandchild

‘Did you really deserve the Nobel prize?’ I ask Amartya Sen. ‘Why do you think you won?’ When you’re sitting opposite the world’s most respected living economist, at a time when the dismal science is under intense scrutiny, an opening question should be punchy. Thankfully, Sen, an 83-year-old Harvard professor, has a sense of humour. ‘You can’t ask me that,’ he says with a grin. ‘I have absolutely no idea why I won.’ He then composes himself. ‘Like any researcher, I’m happy if my work interests others,’ he says carefully. ‘But it would be a pretty bad way to conduct one’s life, thinking about how to win prizes, rather than

Freddy Gray Freddy Gray

Washington Notebook | 26 January 2017

On Wednesday afternoon I went to the British embassy in Washington for ‘a tea and champagne reception’ to mark the inauguration of President Trump. Like most institutions, the embassy has struggled to come to terms with the Donald. We all know (thanks to Twitter) that Trump wants Nigel Farage to be the UK representative in DC, which must leave the current ambassador, Sir Kim Darroch, feeling a bit tense. Still, Sir Kim managed to draw some big Republican beasts to his party: Ted Cruz, Chris Christie, Rand Paul and Newt Gingrich to name but four. Everybody said the special relationship was very special — they would, wouldn’t they? — and

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Brexit’s biggest political victims: Ukip

Perversity is a much undervalued British trait, much more redolent of our real psyche than queuing, drinking tea or being tolerant of foreigners and homosexuals — all things for which we are better renowned. Seeing Dunkirk as a victory was magnificently perverse. So, too, was electing a Labour government in 2005 shortly after we had invaded a sovereign country and created a civil war. For ‘perversity’ I suppose you could read ‘complexity’, although the two often amount to the same thing. Our reactions to stuff are never as straightforward as they should be — they are complex and therefore can seem perverse. And so it is right now. For three

Wednesday

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

PMQs sketch: In which Jeremy Corbyn rebrands the plan to make Britain ‘an offshore tax haven’

Mr Corbyn has spent a week shuddering at goblins that don’t exist. At least outside his head. But he wants his posse of demons to exist in our heads too. So he keeps conjuring them up. He says Mrs May is about to turn Britain into ‘an offshore tax haven.’ Being a Puritan he hasn’t noticed that this has an attractive, Hefner-ish feel. It suggests white sands and azure waves, the tinkling of steel-drums, and bottles of Red Stripe being served at ten cents a time by pouting lovelies straining out of their bra-cups. To be fair, Corbyn’s team of wordsmiths have spotted the problem. So the boss has been

James Forsyth James Forsyth

PMQs: Corbyn gives one of his worst performances yet

It is one of the oldest tricks in the book: make news just before the leader of the opposition gets up at PMQs to wrong foot them. This is what Theresa May did to Jeremy Corbyn today, announcing that there will be a government white paper on Brexit after all. The Labour leader was clearly thrown by this, and never recovered. He ended up turning in one of his worst PMQs performances. Though, it is worth noting that May still hasn’t said when this white paper will be published. To make things worse, Corbyn began by offering condolences to the family of a policeman shot in Belfast at the weekend.

Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: Jeremy Corbyn mistakenly claims police officer is dead

Oh dear. To describe today’s Prime Minister’s Questions as bad for Labour would be an understatement. After Jeremy Corbyn was put on the backfoot by Theresa May over the government’s Brexit white paper, he was left lost for words as he stumbled around for questions. To make matters worse, he also managed to mess up an attempt to offer his condolences to the police officer ‘who lost his life’ in Northern Ireland. The snag? The police office in question is not dead. In truth, the police officer is alive after being shot in the arm. Jeremy Corbyn mistakenly offers condolences to family of police officer attacked in NI. Officer wounded but

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Should the government publish a Brexit White Paper?

Just a year ago, the phrase ‘Brexit rebels’ denoted Tory MPs like Peter Bone who had a distinguished pedigree of pushing the government to be as Eurosceptic as possible, with the odd eccentric comment along the way. Today, it means former Cabinet ministers such as Nicky Morgan, who are trying to push the government away from a ‘Hard Brexit’ – also with the odd eccentric comment about trousers. Those new Brexit rebels are now demanding that the government publish a White Paper on Brexit. Morgan, Dominic Grieve and Anna Soubry want the government to ‘formalise the government strategy in a “reasoned fashion”’, as Grieve put it. This really isn’t the

Helen Nugent

Brexit, HSBC, energy and pensions

Some gloomy news this morning as toy manufacturers and brewers announce price hikes to their products. The Guardian reports that the price of some toys, including Lego and Peppa Pig merchandise, could increase by up to 15 per cent as a result of the plunging pound. Natasha Crookes, spokeswoman for the British Toy and Hobby Association, said most UK toy makers, who typically design products in Britain but have them manufactured and imported from east Asia, had managed to contain price rises until now. Meanwhile, Heineken and Carlsberg have become the latest beer makers to raise prices, following MolsonCoors – maker of the UK’s most popular beer, Carling – and ABInBev, whose stable of

Tuesday

Richard Ekins

What the Supreme Court got right and wrong in today’s judgment

The Supreme Court has today rejected the Government’s appeal from the High Court judgment by a majority of eight justices to three.  The decision means that a new Act of Parliament will now be required before the Government may lawfully trigger Article 50.  However, the Court has also unanimously dismissed the devolution challenges, which argued that the consent of the devolved legislatures in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland was a constitutional precondition to Brexit. The judgment is obviously important, but perhaps less important than once assumed.  The litigation was launched immediately after the referendum.  While it was framed as an attempt to vindicate parliamentary sovereignty, the point of the litigation

Tom Bill

Don’t blame Brexit: the vote to leave the EU has had little effect on the housing market

As a former property journalist I understand why the media uses Brexit to explain the performance of the UK housing market. Or even, at a stretch, Donald Trump. House prices are a national obsession, but a Brexit headline gives the story an extra dimension. Coverage of all three subjects is likely to intensify in 2017, as this morning’s Article 50 verdict reminded us, so it seems like an appropriate moment to examine how close the links are between house prices, the UK’s decision to leave the European Union and the new US President. First, let’s look at prime central London (PCL), where you would expect the biggest impact to be

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Nicola Sturgeon’s Brexit charade continues

With the predictability of an atomic clock, Nicola Sturgeon has come out today condemning the Supreme Court which has reminded her that foreign affairs are not devolved, so Brexit is handled by the UK government on behalf of everyone in the UK. She concludes that ‘Scotland’s voice is not being heard and not being listened to within the UK’. She started wanting to find a compromise about Brexit, she said, trying to be reasonable. But she – or, rather Scotland because they are of course the same thing – faces ‘hard-right Brexit opinion’. Nicola Sturgeon on the UK Government not having to consult the Scottish Government before triggering Article 50. https://t.co/pfqV2e3r2F pic.twitter.com/JX6OFPyxfX —

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

How ‘straightforward’ can the Government’s Brexit bill actually be?

The Government may be accepting its defeat in the Supreme Court graciously overall, but David Davis was in a rather dismissive mood when he responded to Labour’s questions about the ruling in the House of Commons this afternoon. The Brexit Secretary gave a statement to the House explaining that ministers would publish ‘within days’ a bill that would give the Government the legal power to trigger Article 50. Both in the statement and in his responses to questions about it, he repeatedly told the Chamber that it would be a ‘straightforward’ bill. Meanwhile the Government had already offered MPs plenty of scrutiny of the Brexit negotiations, and the Prime Minister had

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

The mental gymnastics of the Brexit debate

What a lot of contortions we are seeing this morning from so many quarters about the Article 50 ruling. Brexiteers such as Iain Duncan Smith are cross with the Supreme Court for ruling that Parliament must have a say on triggering the process for Brexit, with the former Tory leader telling the BBC this morning that the judgement raised ‘real constitutional issues’: ‘They have stepped into new territory here, where they have actually told parliament not just that they should do something, but actually what they should do. I think that leads further down the road to real constitutional issues about who is supreme in this role.’ There is something

Ross Clark Ross Clark

Why doesn’t the ‘tyranny of the majority’ bother MPs during elections?

Older readers might remember the night in April 1992 when, unexpectedly, a tyranny of the majority returned John Major’s Conservative government to power. That same night a local bunch of tyrants in Huntingdon sent Major back to Westminster with a majority of over 30,000, while a tyrannical mob up in Nottingham did the same for Ken Clarke – who was to become Home Secretary and later Chancellor. Funny enough, though, I don’t recall either John Major or Ken Clarke using the word ‘tyranny’ at the time – or anything approaching it. On the contrary, I vaguely remember them making remarks as to the effect that the good old British people

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Breaking: Government loses Article 50 case

Isabel Hardman is joined by Fraser Nelson and James Forsyth to discuss the ruling: In the past few minutes, the Supreme Court has delivered its ruling in the Article 50 case on taking Britain out of the European Union. The Government has lost. It had argued that it did not need an Act of Parliament before triggering the mechanism. The Court ruled by eight judges to three that the Government did need the authority of Parliament in order to start the process. You can read the full judgement here. But the Court also ruled unanimously that Brexit is a matter for the Westminster parliament and not the devolved assemblies. This means

Philip Kyle

Is Benoît Hamon France’s answer to Jeremy Corbyn?

He was supposed to be the third man of the French Socialist primary held on Sunday. While all eyes were on Manuel Valls, the steely former Prime Minister, and Arnaud Montebourg, the charismatic former Economy Minister, the somewhat subdued former education minister Benoît Hamon was never considered a potential frontrunner. And yet only a couple of weeks after Francois Fillon’s shock victory in the conservative primary, history seems to be repeating itself. Hamon has not won yet, but with over 36 percent of the votes he has a comfortable advance after the first round. Valls, who finished second with 31.1 percent of the votes, was quick to state that ‘a

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

The Supreme Court ruling, like the Brexit vote, has defended the sovereignty of parliament

I’ve never been a big fan of the Supreme Court, seeing it as a Blairite invention and – given our position in the European Union – a misnomer. But its decision to back the High Court and remind Theresa May that only parliament can dissolve laws that parliament makes is welcome. It has issued a useful refresher on constitutional law to certain MPs who might, in the excitement of the Brexit vote, have forgotten it. The 17.4 million who voted for Britain to leave the European Union were giving advice, rather than an instruction, to Parliament. This ought not to be a controversial point. As the judgment said, David Cameron chose to hold a consultative

Monday

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Theresa May’s ‘industrial’ rebrand

Theresa May’s industrial strategy, launched today at a special Cabinet meeting just outside Warrington, is part of the Prime Minister’s efforts to show that she is doing interesting and original things on the domestic front while also working on the Brexit negotiations. It is also part of her attempt to show that she is different from her predecessors in government. But how different? The 132-page consultation document, Building Our Industrial Strategy, focuses on ‘creating the right conditions for new and growing enterprises to thrive, not protecting the position of incumbents,’ according to Business Secretary Greg Clark. But this is a contrast with the ‘fatally flawed’ plans of the 1970s, rather