Politics

Jeremy Corbyn becoming Labour leader will make it much more difficult for David Cameron to bring a vote to the House of Commons authorising British involvement in air strikes against the so-called Islamic State in Syria. That’s the received wisdom, anyway, but is it true? Tom Newton Dunn reported in the Sun this week that ‘dozens’ of Labour MPs were prepared to defy their party whip if it forbade support for action in Syria, which would mean the government would be able to cobble together a majority of Conservative MPs and Labourites, even if a group of Tories defied their whip. Yesterday the Prime Minister told the Commons that the

If Jeremy Corbyn is elected Labour leader on Saturday, does this mean the party will lose the next general election? Lord Ashcroft has produced a new report, Project Red Dawn, which examines why Labour lost the 2015 general election and what it needs to do to win again. His findings all point to another defeat under Corbyn’s leadership. Ashcroft’s research says the single biggest reason Labour lost was Ed Miliband, who defectors said was not up to the job of Prime Minister. The Tories will undoubtedly do their utmost to paint Corbyn — who has less experience in office than Miliband — in exactly the same light. Defectors to the Conservative party were put off by the

[audioplayer src=”http://rss.acast.com/viewfrom22/merkelstragicmistake/media.mp3″ title=”James Forsyth and Holly Baxter debate Merkel’s offer to Syrian refugees” startat=38] Listen [/audioplayer]Of all the irresponsible decisions taken in recent years by European politicians, few will cause as much human misery as Angela Merkel’s plan to welcome Syrian refugees to Germany. Hailed as enlightened moral leadership, it is in fact the result of panic and muddled thinking. Her pronouncements will lure thousands more into the hands of unscrupulous people-traffickers. Her insistence that the rest of the continent should share the burden will add political instability to the mix. Merkel has made a dire situation worse. On Tuesday last week, Germany declared that any Syrian who reaches the

With the drone killing in Syria of Reyaad Khan and Ruhul Amin, Britain joins an exclusive club. Only Israel and the United States publicly admit to carrying out targeted killings – assassinations – away from the hot battlefield. Yet as both of these nations have already found, a single killing today can lead to a conveyor belt of death further on. The challenge for the UK is whether it can do things differently. Israel targeted and killed hundreds of alleged militants in the West Bank and Gaza during the Second Intifada using snipers, booby-traps and drones. Indeed it was Israel which coined the term ‘targeted killing’ – a more palatable

My six-year-old, when told that there was a princess of England with the same name as her, was astonished to learn that such things existed. ‘In real life, not in princess-land?’ She assumed princesses only lived in some made-up world along with dragons and trolls and daddy’s savings account. One of the arguments made against the monarchy is that it is inherently ridiculous and belongs in a children’s story. But as we mark 64 years under the Elizabethan junta, it is worth noting that it’s the very absurdity of monarchy that makes it egalitarian and anti-authoritarian, in that it keeps powerful people in their place. If we were ever to

Jeremy Corbyn’s lack of experience in office makes it hard to predict how he will act as Labour leader. His tens of thousands of supporters are crowing that a new political age will begin on Saturday and are looking forward to a shadow cabinet made of like-minded folk from the hard-left — Diane Abbott, Michael Meacher etc. But the signs so far suggest that Corbyn as Labour leader will operate differently to Corbyn to march leader. Today’s Guardian offers an explanation why. The list of shadow cabinet ministers who would refuse to serve under Corbyn is growing, along with a unease among Labour MPs about a split between its Parliamentary party and grassroots. Chris Leslie, Emma Reynolds, Yvette Cooper and Tristram Hunt have