Politics Archives

Tuesday

6 Dec 2016

Michel Barnier plays hardball on Brexit

Michel Barnier, the Commission’s Brexit negotiator, has been giving a running commentary on Brexit this morning. Barnier, striking a predictably tough stance before the negotiations start, said that he wants the divorce aspects of the Article 50 deal concluded by October 2018, to give sufficient time for ratification. This, essentially, means that there’ll be one year of negotiations from after the German elections next autumn. But Barnier’s position is that only once this deal has been agreed, can talks move on to what the future relationship between the UK and the EU will be. In other words, no talks on trade until the exit process has been agreed. He emphasised

The Spectator

Spectator live blog: The Supreme Court’s Brexit hearing, day two

The second day of the Supreme Court hearing has seen the Government continue to put forward its case for why it should be allowed to pull the Article 50 trigger without the say so of Parliament. And Lord Pannick has been arguing why Parliament must give approval for the start of the process of Brexit. Here’s how the day unfolded on our Spectator live blog: 4.30pm: Pannick’s main pitch is about the power of Parliament. He tells the Supreme Court that ‘Parliament is sovereign and only Parliament can remove that which it has incorporated into domestic law’ – meaning that Brexit cannot be started by the Government without the agreement of Parliament. He

Tom Goodenough

What the papers say: Is time up for the EU?

Something is happening across Europe, says the Sun – but EU leaders are still intent on burying their heads in the sand. Following Matteo Renzi’s defeat in the Italian referendum on Sunday and far-right Eurosceptic candidate Norbert Hofer’s good showing in the Austrian election, it’s clear that ‘voters across Europe are increasingly rejecting the EU’s self-interested ruling consensus,’ the paper says. But while the outcome for the continent does not look good, the signs of instability in Europe can arguably be only a good omen for Theresa May as she looks to negotiate Britain’s Brexit deal. The Sun argues that this instability ‘strengthens Theresa May’s hand’ and suggests that the increasing

Brendan O’Neill

A Eurosceptic union is forming across Europe

Of all the barbs fired at us Brexiteers, the one that’s irritated me most is ‘Little Englander’. The suggestion is that pro-EU people are broad-minded Europhiles while Brexiteers are petty nationalists who want to dismantle the Chunnel and while away our days drinking tea and slagging off Germans. It couldn’t be more wrong. In fact, the most wonderful thing about Brexit — glorious, rebellious Brexit — is the new European unity it is forging. Far from giving an English two-fingered salute to the continent, the Brexit bug is helping bring the continent together, uniting peoples who’ve had a gutful of the technocrats. The overthrow of Matteo Renzi is 2016’s latest

Monday

5 Dec 2016

Barnaby Martin

Italy will soon be haunted by its inability to reform

Matteo Renzi has resigned from being Prime Minister of Italy but he has not resigned from the Democratic Party. He has not done a David Cameron or David Miliband and left public life. This means that he will be back next year, and it also means that he will act as kingmaker in the coming days. Right now, he will be working away behind the scenes to help organise the next coalition government that will soon be ushered in to pass the Budget law and to ensure the smooth passage of the banking bail out. There is zero appetite among Democratic Party members or their junior coalition partners to call a general

Matthew Plummer

John Key’s real legacy is his lack of blunders

Imagine a Tory Prime Minister stepping down after nearly ten years at the top on his own terms. The budget was back in surplus, troublesome referendum results had been quickly forgotten, and the PM still remained overwhelmingly popular, with his party still sitting on around 50 per cent in the polls. No, it’s not the restless dreams of David Cameron, but John Key – New Zealand’s soon-to-be ex-PM, who unexpectedly announced his resignation earlier today. Arguably one of the most successful centre-right leaders in the world since Margaret Thatcher, Key has dominated New Zealand politics for the past decade. His National party has held near-majority government, despite a proportional electoral system that was meant to make such

Ross Clark

A view of St Paul’s is the least of London’s housing problems

Richmond Park has been in the news a bit lately. It is portrayed as a bastion of wealth and privilege, whose residents stand accused of trying to lord it over ordinary voters. But never mind blocking Brexit, do the people who live there deserve the right to an uninterrupted view of St Paul’s? Outrage has greeted the construction of a 42-storey tower in Stratford, East London, which is accused of compromising the view of Wren’s great cathedral from a mound in Richmond Park. Planning permission for Manhattan Loft Gardens, which will incorporate 250 flats as well as a 145-bed hotel, was granted back in 2011. Yet no-one seemed to notice

Steerpike

Ukip struggle to get their message across in Sleaford by-election

Here we go again. As Paul Nuttall tries to prove that Ukip is a professional party on the path to electoral success, he may wish to have a word with his party’s campaigns team. With Ukip fielding a candidate in the Sleaford and North Hykeham by-election, Nigel Farage headed there today to do some broadcast in support of his party. Alas, the campaign banner he stood behind had a glaring error. It read ‘Hykenham’ rather than ‘Hykeham’. In future, Mr S suspects it’s worth double checking the spelling of the constituency before printing the campaign merchandise.

Katy Balls

Amber Rudd gets a rough ride at the despatch box – thanks to Boris

Over the weekend, Boris Johnson managed to plunge himself into another Cabinet row by announcing on Peston on Sunday that he thinks students should be excluded from the net migration numbers — because they are ‘of massive benefit to this country’. As is becoming a pattern, No 10 were quick to slap him down — with the Prime Minister’s spokesman insisting at lobby that ‘students will continue to be part of the figures’. Not that this stopped MPs having some fun with the comments today at Home Office questions. Andrew Tyrie kicked proceedings off by asking — in a convoluted manner — whether Rudd agreed that students should be removed from the tens of

William Cook

Thanks to Brexit and Trump, Austria lost its appetite for political upheaval

Austria’s presidential election has been overshadowed by Matteo Renzi’s dramatic defeat in the Italian referendum, but Alexander Van der Bellen’s victory is significant nonetheless. It confirms there are now two Europes, north and south. Southern members like Italy are becoming increasingly hostile towards the EU, while northern members like Austria will do (almost) anything to keep the EU on track. So why did Austria buck the American trend, and chose a Euro-friendly head of state? Churchill said Russia was a riddle wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma. He might have been talking about Austria today. The Austrian capital, ‘Red’ Vienna, has always been socially liberal and politically leftist. The

Tom Goodenough

Spectator live blog: The Supreme Court’s Brexit hearing, day one

Today’s Supreme Court hearing did, for once, live up to its billing as being a ‘landmark case’. The court’s 11 judges – sitting together for the first time – will hear four days of evidence before ruling next month on the government’s appeal against the decision that Parliament must be given a say on triggering Article 50. Here’s the full coverage from today’s Supreme Court case: 4.30pm: Eadie finishes off his argument with a simple point. He urges the Supreme Court judges to measure their decision based on a test of asking the ‘man in the street’. Would the average person think that the referendum outcome gave the Government the right to kick start

Steerpike

Will Theresa May take her mansplaining mission to Bahrain?

Last month, word began to spread around Whitehall that the Prime Minister would not take kindly to any ‘mansplaining’ — after No 10 took umbrage at male politicians, officials, diplomats and journalists talking over, patronising or failing to listen to May. As the Times revealed, the row was triggered after Sir Mark Lyall Grant, the national security adviser, managed to do at least one of the above during a visit to Downing Street. So, Mr S can’t help but wonder how exactly May is going to get on on her upcoming visit to the Gulf region. On her two-day trip to Bahrain, May will become the first female politician to attend the six-nation Gulf Co-operation Council. While she

Fraser Nelson

Beppe Grillo says he’s ready to govern after Renzi resigns

It started with a blog, and it could end up with a new Prime Minister. Beppe Grillo’s 5-Star movement, which wants Italy out of the Euro, has called for an election within a week – to pick up on the momentum which saw Matteo Renzi lose the referendum by a margin of almost 20 points, far bigger than that indicated by the polls. On his blog, he had this to say:- Hooray! Democracy won! The regime’s liars and its propaganda are the first losers in this referendum. Times have changed. Sovereignty belongs to the people, now we start to really apply our Constitution. The first winners are the citizens who raised their

Steerpike

Westminster fashion police turn on Theresa May

Claws out in Westminster. Since Theresa May was appointed Prime Minister, several of her one-time cabinet colleagues have taken issue with her government’s Brexit stance. After May sacked Nicky Morgan as education secretary, Morgan has become a key member of the post-Brexit awkward squad — regularly voicing criticism of the PM. Over the weekend, the pair’s relationship took another turn for the worse. In an interview with the Times, Morgan made a dig at May over a £1,000 pair of leather trousers the Prime Minister had worn in a photoshoot for the paper the week before. Discussing whether May can really promise to help the ‘just about managing’ families while wearing high fashion, Morgan said it had ‘been noticed and

Sunday

4 Dec 2016

John O'Neill

EU toasts defeat of ‘backward-looking populism’ as Hofer concedes Austrian election

Norbert Hofer has just conceded defeat in Austria’s presidential election after exit polls and interim results showed him losing by 47 per cent to 53 per cent. Victory goes to Alexander Van der Bellen, the 72-year-old former Green party leader. He has said the election result sends a message ‘to the capitals of the EU that one can win elections with high European positions.’ The last time Hofer lost to Van der Bellen, in May, his margin of defeat was just 0.4 per cent, or 31,000 votes. His right-wing populist Freedom Party brought an appeal and Austria’s Constitutional Court ordered the election to be run again. But this time, Hofer seems to

Steerpike

Nick Clegg loses his enthusiasm for a Lib Dem rebrand

In 2011, when the Liberal Democrats’ poll ratings had fallen to 10 per cent, Nick Clegg ordered a rebranding exercise, even looking at whether the party’s name should be changed to distance the Lib Dems from their betrayal on tuition fees. Today, the Lib Dems are still polling around 10 per cent (on a good day). But what about the name change? On the Sunday Politics Clegg offered up a vision of Brexit that would mean staying in the single market and the customs union, paying into the EU budget, keeping free movement and accepting the supremacy of the European Court of Justice – prompting Andrew Neil to say: ‘Your party’s called the Liberal Democrats. Many people

William Cash

How Britain’s legal system went global

It was Henry Fairlie in his famous article in The Spectator in 1955 that made the critical point about the way ‘Establishment’ power (political, legal, media, foreign office, civil service and so on) is exercised in Britain: namely such a ‘matrix’ of influence was exercised ‘socially’, behind closed doors; or maybe ‘closed chambers’ would be more apt as the Supreme Court faces the biggest legal showdown in its short history on Monday 5 December. Charles Moore has come close to saying something similar to Fairlie, while reflecting in the Telegraph on the liberal credentials of certain members of the eleven Supreme Court judges who will be deciding whether to overturn the High Court ruling (brought by Gina Miller)

Saturday

3 Dec 2016

James Forsyth

Austria and Italian voters could plunge the EU into crisis

Voters in Austria and Italy head to the polls tomorrow and could plunge the EU into a political and economic crisis, as I say in The Sun today. In Austria, the candidate of a genuinely far-right party—its first leader was a former SS officer—could become president. If the Freedom Party’s Norbert Hofer does win, and the race is too close to predict with any confidence, it’d show that the very extremist forces that the European project was meant to crush are now on the rise—and in part, because of the EU’s own failings. But it is the Italian referendum that could have the more immediate consequences. Italy bans polls just

The High Court’s Brexit ruling is a product of our ‘post-truth’ age

In November the High Court decided that the Government had no power to give notice to leave the EU under Article 50. Leaving the EU would entail changes in the law that embodied the rights of citizens and such changes could not be brought about by the prerogative power but only by primary legislation in Parliament. The court considered the referendum only advisory, even though in the Parliamentary debate it was made clear that the decision would be implemented by the Government. Moreover, the Government had circulated a leaflet to all households giving a solemn undertaking to honour the decision. On 5 December the Supreme Court will hear an appeal

Friday

2 Dec 2016

Steerpike

Nicholas Soames tries to woo Brexiteers with champagne

Throughout the EU referendum campaign, Nicholas Soames stood firmly on the side of Remain — warning that a vote to Leave would be a ‘terrible mistake’. Since the nation plumped for Brexit, Soames has called on the hard Brexiteers to keep their options open with regards to the deal. When Iain Duncan Smith penned a ConHome blog critcising Remain-ers for demanding the UK stay in the single market, Soames likened it to ‘watching an arsonist return to the scene of his crime because the flames aren’t big enough’. So, Mr S was intrigued to be passed an invitation from Soames to his fellow MPs. He has asked any comrades who think Britain should