Politics

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

Tuesday

Sebastian Payne

The battle for South Thanet — can Nigel Farage win?

Isle of Thanet, Kent ‘Are you having me on?’ a lady shouts from inside her bungalow. ‘I’m going back in the bath.’ As with many residents of Ramsgate, this voter, who is wearing nothing but a towel, can not believe Nigel Farage is on her doorstep. The Ukip leader belts out his hearty laugh as her husband admits the pair will be voting Ukip — another tick on the clipboard. Farage’s cabal of sign carriers and bodyguards shuffle towards the next house before we are interrupted by a group of goths keen for a selfie. They appear too young to vote but Farage happily obliges. Has he got a chance of winning

Douglas Murray

Islamic extremism doesn’t need a rebrand

I have been wondering why nobody so far in this election seems to have made any mention of what most people recognise to be the biggest security problem facing this country. But then I discovered that the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, last week appeared at the Al Falah Islamic Education Centre in West London. He used the opportunity to express, er, ‘concern about the level of Islamophobia in the capital’ and to insist that ‘an alternative word needs to be found to describe extremists who claim to act in the name of Islam’. According to the Evening Standard: ‘Mr Johnson, whose great-grandfather was a Muslim, added that a “problem in

Camilla Swift Camilla Swift

Andrew Marr and the BBC misquoted David Cameron – but how did they get it so wrong?

After yesterday’s piece, in which I called out Andrew Marr for attributing an entirely incorrect quote to the PM on his Sunday morning show, two things have happened. Firstly, as Mr Steerpike reported, Andrew Marr replied on Twitter, saying it was an ‘honest mistake’ and ‘cock up not conspiracy’. @laidmanr @spectator @millsswift oh yes it is: honest mistake – I was wrong – sorry. Cock up not conspiracy, but wrong on my part — Andrew Marr (@AndrewMarr9) April 20, 2015 Secondly, the BBC press office have issued a statement. It explains that Marr wanted to question Cameron about the section of the Conservative manifesto that refers to hunting, shooting and fishing.

Monday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Cautious Miliband doesn’t want to talk about borrowing

Labour is proposing to balance the current not the overall budget. This is presumably because they think that borrowing to spend money on capital projects is a sensible policy. But you wouldn’t have known that from watching Ed Miliband on BBC1 just now. In response to questions from Evan Davis, Miliband was determined not to say that Labour would borrow to invest. In a highly disciplined performance, Miliband would also not engage with Davis’ questions about inequality and whether it was a good thing if everyone got richer even if the gap between rich and poor widened. Indeed, Miliband was so cautious that you began to wonder if he’s started

Steerpike Steerpike

Andrew Marr admits the BBC misquoted David Cameron on foxhunting

After Mr S’s colleague Camilla Swift wrote of the Twitterstorm that engulfed David Cameron after Andrew Marr claimed on air that the PM had declared foxhunting to be his favourite sport, the presenter has now come clean about the interview. Marr has admitted to The Spectator on Twitter that he was wrong to claim that Cameron told Countryside Alliance magazine that foxhunting was his favourite sport: His confession comes after the BBC press office failed to respond to calls for comment from The Spectator. Likewise, Twitter accounts for the BBC Press Office and Andrew Marr Show have remained quiet on the topic, as has the account of Rob Burley, the editor of the Marr Show, despite a

Camilla Swift Camilla Swift

Exposed: the BBC’s ‘foxhunting’ smear against David Cameron

The Prime Minister’s interview on the Andrew Marr Show yesterday showed that despite claims to the contrary, Cameron isn’t lacking in passion; the PM was full of fight and his normal self-confidence. But there was one question he did falter over. ‘You told the Countryside Alliance magazine recently that your favourite sport was foxhunting’, Marr declared. ‘Is that really true?’. Cameron looked utterly bemused, but Marr was so keen on the question that he repeated it: ‘You said: “It’s my favourite sport which I love.” Is that true?’ Perhaps unsurprisingly, a Twitter-storm erupted at the news that Cameron had apparently ‘admitted’ to his favourite sport being foxhunting. But where on earth did

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The tension in Labour’s energy policy between prices and decarbonisation

There has always been a tension in Ed Miliband’s energy policy between its aim to get prices down via the price freeze and its desire to decarbonise the electricity market. That tension was on full display in the BBC Daily Politics Environment Debate this afternoon, the first of a series of policy debates chaired by Andrew Neil. Flint had to clarify that the Labour manifesto wasn’t proposing the 100 per cent decarbonisation of the electricity market. She then had to dodge around the question of whether the green levies on energy bills would have to rise to make this happen. Matthew Hancock, the Tory spokesman for the debate, claimed that

Douglas Murray

What’s more disturbing than a group of discredited old Nazis? The Green Party

Yesterday’s Mail on Sunday had an interesting account of a meeting in London of Nazis, neo-Nazis, British National Party types and anti—Semites of various other hues. The paper infiltrated the meeting and exposed what was said – which is a very good service and deserves praise. But I challenge anyone to look through the photos and biographies of the few participants who gathered at Victoria station and then in a nearby hotel and not reflect that this is a gratifyingly washed-up and pathetic movement. During their deliberations they appear to have gone over the usual stuff about how they think the Holocaust was made up and been used by Jews for their own advantage and

Sebastian Payne

Tories in the lead according to ICM and Lord Ashcroft

The Conservatives are ahead once again in the latest Guardian/ICM poll. They are two points ahead on 34 per cent – but that’s a five point drop since their surprising 39 per cent last week. Labour has dropped one point to 31 per cent. Two of the smaller parties have seen their vote increase, with Ukip on 11 per cent, up four points on last week, and the Liberal Democrats on 10 per cent, up two points. Last week’s ICM poll was clearly an outlier — few believed that the Tories had jumped into majority territory — but Conservatives will still be pleased that this poll has them ahead. But

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Five rules of politics that Nicola Sturgeon has broken

Nicola Sturgeon met my Auntie Patsy over the weekend, then was kind enough to tweet a picture of their encounter (below). Seeing her sandwiched between the two people most likely to break up the union was odd, but so was discovering that many members of my extended family are now voting SNP. Aunt Patsy is, I’m afraid, a typical example: like 1 in 50 Scots she has joined the SNP in the last seven months. She wasn’t really into politics until recently, but has caught the bug (there is a lot of it about in Scotland). .@FraserNelson just met your lovely (@theSNP voting) auntie in Inverurie. She says hello pic.twitter.com/gsfDUPlMoG —

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Why are all the manifestos so rubbish?

So all the manifestos are now out for voters to pore over. Given the amount of fuss the parties have made about these documents, you’d think they might outsell Fifty Shades of Grey. Sadly the reality is that these verbose tomes are less bonkbuster and more borebuster: they’re not written for voters to read, only for sad politicos who are paid to pore over them for fine details. They are getting longer and longer as the years go on, yet politicians don’t seem to be doing a better job at impressing voters, or indeed winning elections. The Tory 2015 manifesto has 82 pages and 34,000 words, up from 28,000 in

Alex Massie Alex Massie

A vote for the SNP is a vote for a Labour government

For decades now the SNP have thirsted for the moment when they can be ‘relevant’ to the outcome of a Westminster general election. Well, they have that relevance now. Never before has the launch of their manifesto attracted this kind of attention. Then again, never before has the SNP had realistic hopes of becoming the third largest party in the House of Commons. But strength is often just weakness disguised and, once again, more than one thing can be true at the same time. And the truth is that the SNP’s position is both remarkably strong and much weaker than many people assume. I still don’t believe that the nationalists will win

Steerpike Steerpike

Ed Miliband was ‘absolutely terrified’ by hen party, bless him

Over the weekend, Mr S brought you the unlikely tale of the Labour leader becoming a pin-up for a brood of hens on a night out in Chester. Sadly his status as a ladies man has taken a bit of a blow this morning, with one hen telling LBC: ‘Bless him he looked terrified, absolutely terrified. And he wouldn’t actually come off the bus. He was just kind of lingering on the steps, waving sort of tentatively.’ There he is, the Miliband we have all come to know and love.

Sebastian Payne

Campaign kick-off: 17 days to go

The campaign’s focus will swing back to Scotland today, with Nicola Sturgeon launching the SNP’s manifesto in Edinburgh. Ed Miliband is also heading north, to address the Scottish TUC and kick off Labour’s latest efforts to attack the Conservatives on the NHS. To help guide you through the melée of stories and spin, here is a summary of today’s main election stories. 1. Last chance to vote More important than any of the news stories, today marks the deadline for registering to vote on May 7. As the splash of today’s Daily Mirror puts it, ‘you can make a difference’. Forget talk of the same old parties with same old ideas, the

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Labour’s gamble for SNP support

The SNP launches its manifesto today in Edinburgh. Nicola Sturgeon will be arguing that the policies in the document are for the benefit of the whole of the United Kingdom, which is a way of reassuring former no-voters who might back the SNP, and also of appealing to the left wing faction of the Labour party. Scottish Labour will be claiming that many of those policies such as voting for lower tuition fees in England are in fact a theft from their own party’s ideas, and that the SNP is in fact using Labour as a think tank for its own manifesto. But what is also interesting is how the

Sunday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

John Major to enter the electoral fray this week

David Cameron’s inner circle are always keen to talk up the parallels between this campaign and 1992. This week, the winner of that election will enter the fray on their behalf. As I report in the Mail on Sunday, John Major will give a speech warning of the dangers to the Union itself if the United Kingdom ends up with a Labour government propped up by the SNP. The Tories hope that Major’s intervention will elevate this point above the usual party political knockabout. They also believe that a former Prime Minister speaking out will make voters pay attention; they were much struck by how much coverage Tony Blair’s speech

Sebastian Payne

Nigel Farage: David Cameron’s ‘fanaticism’ is to blame for Libya migrant crisis

Nigel Farage tends to stick to one line on foreign affairs: no more foreign wars. On the Sunday Politics today, the Ukip leader claimed that the migrant crisis and tragedies in the Mediterranean are the fault of countries such as Britain and France who bombed Libya in 2011: ‘Actually, it was the European response that caused this problem in the first place — the fanaticism of Sarkozy and Cameron to bomb Libya and what they’ve done is to completely destabilize Libya; to turn it into a country with much savagery; to turn it into a place where for Christians the situation is now virtually impossible and we ought to be honest and say

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Angela Eagle: Labour would speak to other parties to get a Queen’s Speech through

On the Sunday Politics just now, Angela Eagle shifted Labour’s position on what it would do in the event of a hung parliament. Previously, Labour has insisted that if it was a minority government it would simply propose a Queen’s Speech and dare the other parties, and in particular the SNP to vote it down. listen to ‘Angela Eagle: we’d speak to any party to get a Queen’s speech through’ on audioBoom But Eagle told Andrew Neil that in the event of a hung parliament Labour ‘would speak to any party that has got representation in the House of Commons in order to try to build a majority for a

Molly Guinness

Duelling advice for Nigel Farage

A Polish prince this week challenged Nigel Farage to a duel. The prince, Yanek Zylinski, blames Farage and Ukip for anti-Polish sentiment in the UK so he’s suggesting they meet in Hyde Park with their swords one morning. The Spectator of 1838 would be disappointed that 21st century princes are still throwing down gauntlets: The pretence on which duelling has been defended – that it serves to polish society – is untenable. The witty Mr Whistlecraft, indeed, speaking of King Arthur’s Knights, avers that: “Their looks and gestures, eager, sharp, and quick, Showed them prepared, on proper provocation, To give the lie, pull noses, stab and kick, Which is the very reason, it

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Feisty Cameron warns English voters of the ‘frightening prospect’ of the SNP propping up a Labour government

David Cameron has just delivered his feistiest performance of the election campaign yet. In a combative interview with Andrew Marr, the Tory leader repeatedly described the prospect of a Labour government propped up by the SNP as ‘frightening’, telling English voters that the SNP wouldn’t ‘care’ about them and their needs. He implicitly warned that SNP MPs supporting a Labour government would result in less money for English constituencies. He had been given this opening by Nicola Sturgeon, who in her interview had made clear how the SNP would use the fixed term parliament act to give them maximum influence on a Labour government. Her point was that the fixed term