Politics

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

Friday

Ross Clark Ross Clark

Will the ‘value for money’ tsar really overrule Rachel Reeves?

Is there any word more laughably misapplied than ‘tsar’? We have already had an ‘antisemitism tsar’ and now we are going to have a ‘value for money’ tsar. Had you suggested to a Russian peasant that their monarch was value for money I suspect you might have ended up floating on the Neva River alongside Rasputin. Admittedly, that is not David Goldstone’s official title – we are supposed to call him Chair of the Office of Value for Money. But he does come with a CV that includes involvement in all kinds of public projects associated with tsarist excess. He was in charge of the delivery authority for the London Olympics, which

John Keiger John Keiger

Why France’s media is keeping quiet about Michel Barnier’s health

France’s 73-year-old prime minister, Michel Barnier, underwent surgery last weekend for a lesion on his upper neck. According to the government spokeswoman yesterday, the operation ‘went well’ and the PM is back at work after two to three days’ rest. French media have been characteristically tight-lipped about the health of France’s second in command and the Fifth Republic’s oldest prime minister.  French media have been characteristically tight-lipped about the health of France’s second in command Le Monde – sometimes thought of as an unofficial organ of the state – merely trotted out the official communiqué; Le Figaro added that the operation was considered benign and that test results will be known in

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

Can Labour save its Budget?

After the Office for Budget Responsibility’s assessment of the Budget was published on Wednesday, the cost of government borrowing started to rise. Yesterday, those costs hit their highest levels this year, with the 10-year gilt yield peaking just over 4.5 per cent and the five-year gilt yield exceeding 4.4 per cent, before settling slightly by the end of the day.  Labour need this trend to stop. The further borrowing costs rise and the pound falls, the more expensive Reeves’s Budget becomes, as investors demand a higher return for lending to the UK. Moreover, the longer jitters persist, the more certain it will seem that markets have not bought Labour’s fiscal

Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: Darren Jones admits Budget will hit working people

Well, well, well. It’s day three of the Budget and it appears that Rachel Reeves’s fiscal statement has begun to rather quickly unravel. Appearing on Sky News this morning was Chief Secretary to the Treasury. In a rather awkward interview, Darren Jones faced a grilling from Sky’s Wilfred Frost on just how much people in the UK will be hit by newly-announced budgetary measures and specifically on whether this Budget really does protect working people after all. It’s quite the watch… WF: Yesterday the Chancellor said wage increases might be slightly less than they otherwise would have been. De facto that is clearly a hit on working people. Paul Johnson

Arieh Kovler

There may soon be peace in Lebanon

If the leaks and briefings are to be believed, Israel is getting ready to end its war in Lebanon. With the US pushing hard, and after a successful military campaign, reports say that Israeli leaders are looking to make a deal. Lebanese Hezbollah joined Hama’s war against Israel on 8 October, 2023; around 100,000 Israeli civilians have evacuated the border area. Almost immediately after Israeli troops moved into the Gaza Strip, determined to oust Hamas and release the hostages captured on 7 October, there were negotiations, brokered by Qatar, Egypt and the USA, to try and reach some kind of deal that would free the hostages and end the war. Apart

Brendan O’Neill Brendan O’Neill

Radiohead’s Thom Yorke has the perfect riposte to the anti-Israel bores

Finally, a celeb has stood up to the Israel bashers. It took the famously dour frontman of Radiohead to do it. At a solo gig in Melbourne, Thom Yorke was heckled by an audience member smugly demanding to know why he hasn’t spoken out about Israel’s ‘genocide’ in Gaza. Yorke wasn’t having it. He even called the caterwauling gig ruiner a ‘coward’. It’s the best thing he’s done since OK Computer. Shaky footage filmed by his fellow concert-goers captured the man yelling at Yorke. From deep in the audience he barked something about the ‘Israeli genocide of Gaza’ and said half of those killed ‘were children’. He challenged Yorke to

Julie Burchill Julie Burchill

The Women’s Equality party deserves its fate

Of all the grotesque modern types who cast a silly-yet-sinister shadow over the dog-days of Western civilisation – the Queers for Palestine, the Jew-baiting anti-racists, the humanity-hating eco-nuts – the Transmaid has a special step of shame very near the top. The Transmaid is a handmaid, like in Margaret Atwood’s novel, with two vital differences. Transmaids get everywhere, but they are often to be found in showbusiness and politics Transmaids often curry favour, not with regular men – indeed, they may often think of themselves as feminists who hate the patriarchy – but with men who say they are women. This means they do not really practise feminism at all,

Hamish McRae

Britain can grow faster than the OBR thinks

The UK economy may end up growing a bit faster by the end of this decade than the Office for Budget Responsibility expects – but if it does that will be no thanks to Rachel Reeves’s Budget.  The OBR’s projections are unambitious. This is their summary: ‘Having stagnated last year, the economy is expected to grow by just over 1 per cent this year, rising to 2 per cent in 2025, before falling to around 1½ per cent, slightly below its estimated potential growth rate of 1⅔ per cent, over the remainder of the forecast. Budget policies temporarily boost output in the near term, but leave GDP largely unchanged in five years.’

Thursday

Jamie Blackett

Labour’s farm tax makes no sense

Amid the furore over Lord Alli’s contributions to Lady Starmer’s wardrobe the new environment secretary, Steve Reed, was able to stay under the radar. Most of us weren’t aware that he had been schmoozing his way around British farms during the election campaign wearing brand new, top of the range Le Chameau wellies – also apparently gifted by the ubiquitous Lord Alli. At the time Reed was promising that Labour had no intention of changing Agricultural Property Relief. In fact, responding to an accusation by his Tory opponent, Steve Barclay, he dismissed it as ‘desperate nonsense’. The efforts of the generations before me may all have been for nothing So

Lara Prendergast Lara Prendergast

Team Trump, astrologers versus pollsters & debating history

43 min listen

This week: Team Trump – who’s in, and who’s out? To understand Trumpworld you need to appreciate it’s a family affair, writes Freddy Gray in the magazine this week. For instance, it was 18-year-old Barron Trump who persuaded his father to do a series of long ‘bro-casts’ with online male influencers such as Joe Rogan. In 2016, Donald’s son-in-law Jared Kushner was the reigning prince; this year, he has been largely out of the picture. Which family figures are helping Trump run things this time around, and which groups hold the most influence? Freddy joins the podcast alongside economics editor Kate Andrews. What are the most important personnel decisions facing

Lois McLatchie Miller

The wrong-sightedness of ‘buffer zones’

As of today, in Britain, it will be illegal to ‘intentionally or recklessly influence any person’s decision to access… abortion services’ within approximately 500 feet of the building. If the national law mirrors local prototypes, it may even prohibit silent prayer, or offers of help. Politicians voted to implement these localised bans – known as ‘buffer zones’ – under the guise of needing to restrict harassment near abortion clinics. A noble cause, yet one without a basis of need. Harassment is already illegal in the UK. A government review proved that in mild-mannered England, instances of harassment near clinics are ‘relatively few’, and easily policed under existing laws. Instituting buffer

Freddy Gray Freddy Gray

When it comes to trash talk, you can’t beat the Donald

‘Garbage In, Garbage Out’ is a computer programming principle which states that the quality of a system’s output is determined by the quality of its input. It’s also a phrase that speaks to US politics this week.  After a string of good news cycles for the Republican campaign, the Democrats finally believed they had caught a break on Sunday night after the comedian Tony Hinchcliffe made a joke about Puerto Rico on stage at Trump’s mega-rally in Madison Square Garden in New York. ‘I don’t know if you know this but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now,’ said Hinchcliffe. ‘It’s called Puerto

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

Can Rachel Reeves calm the markets?

The more investors dig into Labour’s first Budget, the less they seem to like it. After the Office for Budget Responsibility published its assessment of the Chancellor’s measures yesterday afternoon, some immediate (and expected) volatility set in. But rather than settling down, market jitters seem to have worsened today, as a gilt sell-off saw government borrowing costs hit their highest level in 2024 this afternoon, with the 10-year gilt yield reaching 4.52 per cent and the five-year gilt yield reaching 4.41 per cent. So far the situation is manageable for the government – but is a strong indication that the markets are not quite as on-side with their plans for

Steerpike Steerpike

China hawks hit back at Lammy rapprochement

First, it was the Chagos Islands. Then it was David Lammy’s visit. Now many in Westminster are asking: when it comes to China, where does this government draw the line? In recent weeks it has been reported that Labour is both dropping plans to classify Beijing’s treatment of Uyghur Muslims as a ‘genocide’ and is pushing to reopen trade talks via the Jetco forum. So much for getting tough on Xi eh? Mr S hears word though that already a backlash is under way. The seven current and former parliamentarians who were sanctioned by China in March 2021 have fired off an angry reprimand to Lammy, in the wake of

Edward Howell

What’s upset Kim Jong-un?

When Kim Jong-un does not get what he wants, he makes his displeasure known far and wide. Over the past few weeks, one would have thought that Kim would be reasonably content. In return for sending artillery shells, ballistic missiles, and most recently, troops to Russia, North Korea has been receiving food, cash, and most likely, technological assistance, the latter which is what Kim craves the most. But instead of calming down, Kim has responded in the way that he knows best – by launching yet another intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) designed to hit the US mainland. Relations between the two Koreas have plummeted to a nadir over the past

Steerpike Steerpike

Treasury staff leave a mess after Budget tax hikes

For most Brits, there was little to celebrate in Rachel Reeves’s fiscal statement – but that didn’t stop Treasury staff from toasting the Budget. Just hours after the Chancellor delivered her 80-minute speech to MPs on Wednesday, Treasury aides made the short hop across St James’s Park to Westminster’s Two Chairmen pub. From 4 p.m. onwards, while gilt yields continued to rise and markets tried to make sense of Labour’s plans, Whitehall mandarins drank the afternoon away in a post-Budget bash. But not everyone was left feeling merry by the end of the night… Despite Reeves enthusiastically announcing that pubgoers can now enjoy a ‘penny off a pint’, Steerpike noted

Steerpike Steerpike

Businessman tears up over Labour’s Budget

The first full day post-Budget has not been a happy one. While Labour’s spinners are hard at work trying to convince the nation – and themselves – that Rachel Reeves’s fiscal statement was a success, real people across the country are reeling from Wednesday’s announcement. Mr S wrote yesterday about how leading figures in the hospitality industry were quick to express their outrage at Reeves’s call to raise alcohol duty – but this isn’t the only sector in shock at the Chancellor’s proposals. Salon Employers Association founder Toby Dicker spoke on Sky News today about the impact Labour’s Budget will have on his business. At times finding himself emotional, and

Ross Clark Ross Clark

Why should we trust the IMF?

It wasn’t an aggrieved business leader, facing a sharply increased wage bill thanks to the Budget, that led the 8 a.m. news bulletin on Radio 4 this morning, but the reassuring verdict of the IMF. ‘We support the envisaged reduction in the deficit over the medium term, including by sustainably raising revenue,’ the body declared. It rather seemed as if the BBC was trying to tell us: never mind the carping from the Tories and other enemies of the government; here is a highly respected, disinterested body of wise men and women telling us that Rachel Reeves’s Budget was great. To be fair, Nick Robinson did give the Chancellor a

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Will Rachel Reeves hike taxes even higher?

Rachel Reeves has spent the morning out on the media round trying to sell her first Budget to the public. The Chancellor woke to a critical reception from the media – with headlines including ‘Halloween Horror Show’, ‘Nightmare on Downing Street’ and ‘Return of tax and spend’. Meanwhile, she is facing a backlash from the farming community, citing betrayal over the news that inheritance tax relief for farms will be limited to £1 million. When pressed, Reeves would not rule out further tax rises later down the line Speaking to the BBC’s Nick Robinson, Reeves was put on the defensive as she was asked to explain why she claimed ‘every

Steerpike Steerpike

Revealed: Reeves’s tax rises expose Labour’s misleading manifesto claims

Casting his mind back to the election, Mr S recalls a heated debate about which party would raise taxes most. In the final televised debate before the national poll, Sir Keir Starmer was quick to accuse then-PM Rishi Sunak of ‘repeating a lie’ – that Labour were going to raise taxes by £2,000 per person. And, to be fair, he had a point: on Sunak’s own maths the Tories would have raised taxes by, er, £3,000 per person. Awkward… Mr S’s friends at The Spectator’s DataHub have crunched all the manifestos put out at the time to see just who really would be responsible for the greatest tax hikes – with