Politics Archives

Wednesday

23 Sep 2015

Tim Farron tells Lib Dems to roll up their sleeves and prepare for government

The Liberal Democrats’ autumn conference rolls to a close today with Tim Farron’s keynote address. In light of the party’s humiliating performance in May’s general election, the overwhelming theme of the Bournemouth gathering has been one of comfort and reconciliation. Unlike Labour’s conference next week, which is likely to have more self-loathing overtones, Farron is focusing on the positive side of the Lib Dem years in government and Nick Clegg’s leadership. In his speech today, the new Lib Dem leader will deny it was all a mistake: We are proud of what we did in Government. Proud of our record and proud of our party. You know, there are those that would like me

Ed West

Do political activists really need to be naked to make their point?

When did political campaigns become so vain? The latest instance involves a bunch of clowns from Spain (they’re literally clowns, I mean) protesting against the Israeli security barrier by standing in front of the wall, naked. A statement on their Facebook page said: ‘When you stand before this shameful fence, all of humanity is naked. The decision to be photographed as naked clowns was meant to remind us that all of humanity has lost its respect by allowing such barriers to exist.’ The Palestinians, unsurprisingly, called this ‘disgusting’. Personally I find it hilarious; the funniest thing involving white people abroad since Andrew Hawkins’s African apology tour. But does any cause these

Tuesday

22 Sep 2015

Steerpike

David Cameron injects extra venom into his feud with Lord Ashcroft

While Number 10 has refused to comment on the claims made in Lord Ashcroft’s David Cameron biography, the Prime Minister did manage to make a small reference to the book at a dinner last night at the Carlton Club. James Landale, the BBC’s deputy political editor, says that Cameron appeared to acknowledge his old foe Ashcroft’s book — which includes accusations of drug taking and intimate relations with a dead pig — during a speech at a Conservative fundraising dinner at the London club: ‘He told the 300 guests that he had had to go to hospital earlier in the day for a bad back, the result of some over-energetic wood chopping in

Alex Massie

Do English Tories care more about the EU than the UK?

This morning Ruth Davidson, leader of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party, outlined the extent to which she agrees with Nicola Sturgeon, leader of the Scottish National Party. Both wish Scotland, and indeed the United Kingdom, to remain a member of the European Union. It is true, as Ms Davidson noted, that the SNP oppose even holding a referendum on the terms of British membership but it is also the case that, at least notionally, each wish, or are on record as desiring, a broadly comparable set of EU-wide reforms. Now, as Mark Wallace rightly observes, Davidson’s case for continued EU membership is a purely practical one. The emotional and

Isabel Hardman

Why is Parliament debating a petition written by ‘total bigots’?

Shortly after MPs return from the conference recess, they will debate a petition that orders the government to ‘close all borders and prevent more immigrants from entering Britain’ because ‘foreign citizens are taking all our benefits’ and ‘many of them are trying to change UK into a Muslim country’. It then adds that ‘there is footage of foreigners destroying British soldiers [sic] graves, which is a huge disrespect to us’. The petition has sailed past the 100,000 signature threshold and has over 185,000 names on it, which means it must be considered for debate in Parliament. MPs on the Petitions Committee have given it a Westminster Hall debate on 19

Steerpike

Emily Thornberry risks another Twitter gaffe with pig jibe

Emily Thornberry has only just made it back onto the frontbench after she had to resign from the shadow cabinet over a tweet she sent of a photo of a house covered with St George flags during the Rochester and Strood by-election. However, despite discovering the dangers of Twitter first hand, the Labour MP has not been put off using it to share her more risqué thoughts. Following yesterday’s #piggate scandal involving David Cameron, Thornberry has tweeted a photo of some curiously titled cured meat, along with a pig emoticon: With many users on Twitter taking it to be a dig at the Prime Minister over the unconfirmed claim he once

James Delingpole

The truth about me, David Cameron, drugs and Supertramp

[audioplayer src=”http://rss.acast.com/viewfrom22/thegreatbritishkowtow/media.mp3″ title=”Rod Liddle and James Delingpole debate if all right wing people have bad music tastes” startat=700] Listen [/audioplayer]This week I woke up shocked to find myself on the front page of the Daily Mail. Apparently I’m the first person in history to have gone on the record about taking drugs with a British prime minister. But it’s really no big deal is it? Had I thought so, I’d never have spilled the beans. In fact, I think it’s one of those perfect non-scandal scandals in which all parties benefit. Dave acquires an extra bit of hinterland and is revealed to have been a normal young man. I get

Sebastian Payne

Will David Cameron deliver ‘associate membership’ of the EU for Britain?

The timetable for the EU referendum has yet to be announced but campaigners are already preparing for a vote next year. In a piece for POLITICO Europe today, I look at the various folks who will be campaigning for a Brexit and how they intend to win. While Matthew Elliott and Dominic Cummings are laying the foundations for a professional campaign based on a moderate message about jobs and economic security, Ukip has other ideas about how to win. The kippers are going to be a significant voice in the referendum but Nigel Farage has said he won’t be seeking to lead the Leave campaign. Instead, he appears to be content doing his own thing. The party believes that

Steerpike

Lib Dem ‘Glee Club’ goes to party conference

As the Liberal Democrats try and find a place for themselves in politics following a disastrous election result, the party can at least pride itself on having the most musical party conference. After their Lib Dem Disco over the weekend, a Lib Dem Glee Club is at conference today: Alastair Carmichael leads #ldconf in song… Glee Club goes crazy pic.twitter.com/uqFckm8KDl — Sophy Ridge (@SophyRidgeSky) September 22, 2015 Sky News’s Sophy Ridge, who is covering this year’s Lib Dem conference, says there is a ‘Glee Club’ karaoke song book dedicated to the late Charles Kennedy. In this, they list a range of classics for which they have rewritten the lyrics to reflect

Steerpike

Anthony Seldon takes Isabel Oakeshott to task over #piggate

With doubts cast over the credibility of Lord Ashcroft’s unofficial biography of David Cameron following ‘piggate‘, his co-author Isabel Oakeshott appeared on Newsnight to defend ‘Call Me Dave’. Cameron’s official biographer Sir Anthony Seldon joined the former Sunday Times political editor in the studio where he raised concerns about the book: ‘Quite frankly, why are we here talking about stories that well might not be true, put up by a very rich man whose personal promotion prospects are of no interest to the nation. Why are we talking about this, and what possible relevance has it got to the Prime Minister and how he conducts office? And if there is relevance, if what he

Sebastian Payne

George Osborne: engaging with China is better than ‘megaphone diplomacy’

Britain and China must ‘stick together’ through the ‘ups and downs’ according to George Osborne. The Chancellor is currently touring China to drum up support for a ‘bridge’ with the City of London, as well as attempting to reassure the markets. On the Today programme, Osborne said he is pursuing a close relationship because it will create ‘jobs and investment in Britain’ — but he is not ignoring the human rights concerns either: ‘This is primarily an economic and financial dialogue but of course we’re two completely difficult political systems and we raise human rights issues but I don’t think it’s inconsistent to do more business with more than one fifth of

Isabel Hardman

Speaker Bercow: Corbyn will need to stick with new PMQs tone for months

John Bercow has long made clear that he would like MPs to behave a little better at Prime Minister’s Questions, which he believes is so rowdy that it upsets voters. Well, he seems to have got what he wants, or at least for the first week of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour party. Last night, at a lecture to the think tank Policy Exchange, he was asked about the session, and whether he thought it would improve permanently. The Speaker said he didn’t believe ‘that a huge amount of additional work is required in terms of creative construction of the session’, though he added that the session could be

Monday

21 Sep 2015

Douglas Murray

The shocking truth about the Piers Gaveston society? It’s incredibly dull

Regarding the pig’s ear of a story currently circulating thanks to Lord Ashcroft’s vendetta against David Cameron, perhaps I could add a codicil. As many readers will know, the allegation is that at a Piers Gaveston event attended by David Cameron while a student at Oxford, our present Prime Minister went through an initiation ritual which involved him putting his private member into a pig’s mouth. I doubt that anybody – not even Labour spin doctors or Lord Ashcroft – seriously believes the story. It stinks of the university-years version of a Chinese whisper, whereby any exaggerated urban legend is attributed to the person who becomes most well known after

Steerpike

Coffee Shots: Labour press office taunts David Cameron with Percy Pigs

With the Downing Street press office declining to comment today on allegations from Lord Ashcroft involving the Prime Minister and a dead pig, Labour has also stayed quiet over the claims. However, members of the Labour press office were unable to resist ignoring the alleged incident completely, with press officers giving out sweets to hard-working lobby journalists. The choice of candy? Percy Pigs, of course.

Isabel Hardman

CCHQ will remain neutral during EU referendum campaign

The Conservative Party board has agreed that CCHQ will remain strictly neutral throughout the EU referendum campaign, Coffee House understands. Sources report that this afternoon’s meeting concluded that it was in the best interests of the party that its campaign machine be inaccessible to either side in the campaign. MPs had warned of a split if Tory party resources had been made available, particularly if they were made available for the side of the campaign that David Cameron ends up backing, which is expected to be ‘In’, while many Tory members are in favour of leaving. Earlier, Coffee House revealed that David Cameron was in favour of neutrality. But there will

Sebastian Payne

Labour should learn from Nick Clegg on how to deal with its history

Nick Clegg has stepped back into the limelight today and he’s been pretty chirpy about his party’s time in government – and its prospects for recovering from its election downfall. In his speech to the Liberal Democrats annual conference in Bournemouth, the former Deputy Prime Minister was full of happy thoughts about his party’s time in government — which resulted in 49 MPs losing their seats and its vote share to just eight per cent: ‘Those achievements in Government, in turn, wouldn’t have happened without you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Each and every one of you. Whether you liked or loathed the coalition. Whether you were exhilarated or

Steerpike

Revealed: Boris Johnson’s Piers Gaveston porkies

With Lord Ashcroft’s claim in today’s Daily Mail that David Cameron once enjoyed intimate relations with a dead pig, talk has soon turned to which unnamed Tory MP was the source of the story. With the incident allegedly taking place at an initiation ceremony for the Piers Gaveston dining society – which is named after Edward II’s alleged male lover — it has been suggested that one of Cameron’s Oxford university contemporaries could be the source. While Steerpike is yet to discover which MP is behind the Ashcroft tale, Mr S couldn’t help but remember that one Tory MP previously got himself into trouble for telling porkies concerning Piers Gaveston. When Boris Johnson was

Alex Massie

Is Labour still a Unionist party?

The answer to this question, it turns out, comes from Kenny Dalglish. The answer is mebbys aye, mebbys naw. At the weekend the Scottish party’s former leader suggested Labour should have (some kind of) ‘free vote’ in the event of there being another independence referendum. Kezia Dugdale, the latest occupant of this poisoned throne, conceded Labour MSPs should, if there is another referendum, be free to campaign for independence if that’s where their heart lies. Now, in one respect this makes sense. Labour are in a hopeless position in Scotland right now. Moreover, the party cannot recover unless it wins votes from erstwhile supporters who have crossed the constitutional aisle to support the

Isabel Hardman

Jeremy Corbyn should forget railways if he wants Labour to be a success

Jeremy Corbyn’s first policy pronouncement as Labour leader hasn’t been all that surprising: he wants a ‘People’s Railway’ that will bring the railways back into public ownership line by line. He will have noticed the excited noises that party members made at hustings whenever he mentioned rail renationalisation – and the impatient sighs from the same audience when his rivals for the leadership were cool on the issue. But as Peter Kellner explains today, even though this individual measure is popular, unless Corbyn is able to deal with the public’s fundamental lack of trust in Labour over the economy, he could promise voters every single retail offer they’ve ever dreamed

Dan Hitchens

The Prevent strategy has finally reminded the NUS why free speech is worth defending

It is a startling about-turn. The National Union of Students, who have played a considerable role in the dismal recent history of campus censorship, are suddenly sounding as though they have ingested the complete works of John Stuart Mill. The ‘basic function of universities,’ the NUS declare, is ‘introducing students to a variety of opinions and encouraging them to analyse and debate them’. They are warning of ‘a significant threat to civil liberties and freedom of speech on campuses’. This is a reference to the Prevent counter-terrorism guidelines, which come into force at universities today, and which the NUS is promising to oppose at every level. It is tempting to